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Slain reporter’s family says Syrian forces targeted her

WASHINGTON — New court documents allege Syrian President Bashar Assad’s forces targeted veteran war correspondent Marie Colvin and then celebrated after they learned their rockets had killed her.
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WASHINGTON — New court documents allege Syrian President Bashar Assad’s forces targeted veteran war correspondent Marie Colvin and then celebrated after they learned their rockets had killed her.

The papers were unsealed Monday in a suit her relatives filed against the war-ravaged nation.

Assad has denied that his forces targeted and killed Colvin in 2012 to silence the 56-year-old New York City native’s reporting.

But in new documents unsealed in federal court in Washington, a former Syrian intelligence worker who defected from the country provides details about how Assad’s military and intelligence officials sought to capture or kill journalists.

The intelligence defector said that after Colvin’s death was confirmed, Syrian Maj. Gen. Rafiq Shahadah exclaimed: “Marie Colvin was a dog and now she’s dead. Let the Americans help her now.”