Giuliana Sgrena has changed her story yet again, proving if nothing else that the Il Manifesto reporter understands the news cycle. The Independent (UK) reports that Sgrena now says she doesn't think the Americans were trying to kill her:

The Italian journalist Giuliana Sgrena, who was wounded by American fire last Friday soon after being released by kidnappers in Baghdad, has said that she does not think that the Americans were trying to kill her. "I never said that they wanted to kill me," she said on a television talk show, "but the mechanics of what happened were those of an attack."

In an interview with The Independent, her partner, Pier Scolari, said: "None of us is so stupid as to think the Americans did it on purpose. But the dynamic was that of an ambush and we want a convincing explanation of what happened, because the first American explanation was totally false." ...

Ms Sgrena was widely quoted as saying that the Americans may have wanted to kill her "because they dislike the Italian policy of negotiating with the hostage-takers". But this week she rejected the idea.

After the shooting, she said: "A soldier opened the door on the right-hand side. When he saw us, I had the impression that he was upset. I seem to remember him saying, 'Oh shit!' And when more turned up in an armoured car, I had the sensation that they were unhappy about what had happened."

One of the papers that "widely quoted" Sgrena was the Independent - in fact, the same Peter Popham, who also wrote this article and who probably regrets ever dealing with Sgrena and Scolari. Of course, Popham hardly stands alone as a mouthpiece for the string of nonsense coming from both Sgrena and Scolari regarding the shooting. Most of the American media have treated Sgrena as an objective and unbiased source despite her association with the Communist and strongly anti-American Il Manifesto and used the story to attempt a rehabilitation of the same kinds of slander that resulted in Eason Jordan's ouster at CNN. American media wrote companion pieces about trigger-happy American soldiers at checkpoints by the score while car bombs and roadside IEDs continued to kill almost as many Iraqis and US troops as the number of these backbiting and speculative "analyses".

Let's review how the Sgrena/Scolari story has evolved:

Pier Scolari, Sgrena's partner who flew to Baghdad to collect her, put an even more sinister construction on the events, suggesting in a television interview that Sgrena was the victim of a deliberate ambush. 'Giuliana may have received information which led to the soldiers not wanting her to leave Iraq alive,' he claimed. [Guardian, March 6]

The shooting late Friday was witnessed by Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi's office which was on the phone with one of the secret service agents, said Scolari. "Then the US military silenced the cellphones," he charged.

"Giuliana had information, and the US military did not want her to survive," he added. [Turkish Press, March 5]

Now, of course, Scolari (Sgrena's "life partner") calls such speculation "stupid". I couldn't agree more. Too bad their stupidity seems to have revealed a sympathetic stupidty that runs through the entire global media, including in the US.

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» Contagion or Silence... from My Sandmen
Ms. Sgrena lives to recollect her fortune at retaining her head...never considering the scores whose blood will drench every dollar paid for her liberation...a price far higher than the value of the merchandise it purchased. [Read More]

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» The Italian Journalist Assasination That Wasn't from HCS's Pad
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Tracked on March 12, 2005 11:57 AM

» Italy to Sgrena: "Put a sock in it" from Epoch3 Blog
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Tracked on March 12, 2005 1:08 PM

» SGRENA'S SAGA COMES FULL CIRCLE from Right Wing Nut House
Main Entry: sa·ga Pronunciation: 'sä-g& also 'sa- Function: noun Etymology: Old Norse -more at SAW Date: 1709 1 : a prose narrative recorded in Iceland in the 12th and 13th centuries of historic or legendary figures and events of the heroic a... [Read More]

Tracked on March 12, 2005 2:16 PM