Japanese journalist dies

TOKYO – A Japanese journalist has been killed in Syria while covering the civil war there, Japan’s government said today.

Mika Yamamoto, a veteran war correspondent with the Japan Press, an independent TV news provider that specializes in conflict zone coverage, was killed Monday in the northwestern city of Aleppo, said Masaru Sato, a spokesman with the Foreign Ministry in Tokyo.

Sato said the 45-year-old was hit by gunfire while she and a colleague were traveling with the rebel Free Syrian Army, which is trying to topple the regime of President Bashar Assad.

Yamamoto had covered the war in Afghanistan after 2001 and the 2003 U.S. invasion of Iraq from Baghdad as a special correspondent for NTV, according to Japan Press’ website.