KUWAIT, Dec 22: A well-known French television journalist died in a Kuwaiti hospital on Sunday a day after he was hit by a tank while covering US military exercises in the Kuwaiti desert.

French television broadcaster TF1, for which veteran foreign correspondent Patrick Bourrat had worked for over 20 years, confirmed that he died in the early hours of Sunday. Doctors had initially said he had four broken ribs but his injuries turned out to be more serious.

French President Jacques Chirac paid tribute to Bourrat in a letter sent to TF1’s management.

“Courageous and experienced, he pushed his mission to inform to the sacrifice of himself,” Chirac said.

The US military said on Saturday that the cause of the accident was being investigated but gave no details.

A spokesman at the French embassy in Kuwait told French radio that Bourrat, 50, was hit by a tank after pushing a TF1 cameraman out of its path.

TF1 told Reuters that two company officials had flown to Kuwait this morning and would repatriate Bourrat’s body to Paris later in the day.

In a long career as a foreign correspondent, Bourrat had covered conflicts in Lebanon, the Gulf, Chechnya, and Kosovo.

More than 12,000 US troops are in Kuwait, with many taking part in live-fire training drills as part of the long-running Operation Desert Spring training exercise.

Journalists have been given widespread access to cover the exercise as pressure mounts on Iraqi President Saddam Hussein to give up alleged weapons of mass destruction or face war.—Reuters