Belgian journalist, latest media casualty in Syrian war

Belgium’s veteran war correspondent Yves Debay has been killed while covering the Syrian conflict, the latest media casualty in a war that has already claimed the lives of 19 reporters and 49 citizen journalists since March 2011.Debay was reportedly killed while reporting on fighting between Syrian opposition forces and regime forces loyal to President Bashar al-Assad in Aleppo early on Friday, according to the Information Centre of Aleppo. Debay himself was no stranger to conflict. In 1957, he joined the Belgian army in a reconnaissance unit. Two years later he was reportedly promoted to the rank of tank commander. In 1985 Debay decided to put down his arms and become a journalist, producing a documentary on the French army in 1986. He later became a correspondent for Raids magazine, reporting from the Lebanese civil war, both Gulf wars, Yugoslavia and the 2001 war in Afghanistan. In 2005 he established a new French magazine, Assault. The Committee to Protect Journalists has already declared Syria to be one of the world’s deadliest places in the world for journalists. International NGO Reporters Without Borders has already reported the deaths of 19 reporters and 49 citizen journalists since the beginning of the March 2011 democratic uprising which turned into all-out war between opposition forces and the Syrian army, loyal to President Bashar al-Assad. The Syrian conflict claimed the life of one of the most acclaimed international reporters, Marie Colvin, who died in Homs while on an assignment for the Sunday Times.