KHERSON – Repubblica journalist, Corrado Zunino, was injured during a drone attack on Wednesday which left his Ukrainian interpreter, Bogdan Bitik, dead, officials said. 

 “Our correspondent Corrado Zunino and his collaborator Bogdan Bitik were victims of an ambush by Russian snipers on the outskirts of Kherson,” reads Repubblica’s website. 

 “Bitik unfortunately did not make it and died: he leaves behind his wife and son.”

 Zunino, after being wounded, saved himself by dragging himself away from the vehicle they were travelling in and he was picked up by a car and taken to Kherson hospital. 

 Repubblica has confirmed that both men were “travelling clearly recognising themselves as journalists, wearing vests with the “Press” inscription.”

 The Italian Foreign Minister, Antonio Tajani, has reported that Zunino “is fine and is being followed by the Italian embassy in Kiev.”

 “I am fine, I have a wound on my right shoulder, grazed by the bullet that hit my great friend Bogdan,” Zunino wrote on Twitter on late Wednesday afternoon. 

 The Ukrainian Foreign Minister, Dmytro Kuleba, told Skytg24 that the moment he “learned the news of this ominous event,” he contacted “military forces who will do everything they can to help Zunino.”

cw