Reuters has released the footage captured by cameraman Hiro Muramoto minutes before he was shot and killed on Saturday while covering street protests in Bangkok.
The Japanese journalist had worked for Reuters in Tokyo for 15 years and travelled to the Thai capital on Thursday.
The agency said that his camera was returned to it by protestors after Muramoto, 43, a father of two, died from a gunshot wound to the chest.
Hiro Muramoto’s last camera footage starts behind army lines. It shows an explosion just yards in front of him which sends several soldiers to the ground.
The footage then shows Muramoto continue to film as he slowly backed away.
As the soldiers retreat Muramoto’s footage then details how Red Shirt protestors wielded shields apparently taken from soldiers.
David Schlesinger, Reuters editor-in-chief, said on Saturday: “I am dreadfully saddened to have lost our colleague Hiro Muramoto in the Bangkok clashes.
“Journalism can be a terribly dangerous profession as those who try to tell the world the story thrust themselves in the centre of the action. The entire Reuters family will mourn this tragedy.”
Reuters journalists have paid a heavy price in terms of those killed and injured covering conflict zones in recent years. Their names are remembered in a book of remembrance at the agency’s headquarters in Canary Wharf, London.
In 2008, Reuters cameraman Fadel Shana was killed after being fired on by an Israeli tank in the Gaza strip.
Seven Reuters journalists have been killed in Iraq since the US-led invasion of the country in 2003.
Last week Wikileaks posted online footage taken from US helicopter gunships as they fired on Iraqi civilians and killed Reuters photographer Namir Noor-Eldeen and driver Saeed Chmagh.
Muramoto’s killer remains unidentified.
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