(CBS/AP) BENGHAZI, LIBYA – Ambassador Chris Stevens was wounded but still alive when Libyans stumbled across him inside a room in the American Consulate in Benghazi, 거창콜걸 pulled him out and drove him to a hospital after last week’s deadly attack in the eastern Libyan city, witnesses said.
Fahd al-Bakoush, a freelance videographer, was among the Libyan civilians searching through the consulate after gunmen and protesters rampaged through it last Tuesday night.
CBS News correspondent Charlie D’Agata reports cell phone footage taken by al-Bakoush shows Libyans removing the body of Stevens from the scene that night.
Several men pulled the seemingly lifeless form from the room. They saw he was alive and breathing, his eyelids flickering. Though they took him to be a foreigner, no one recognized him as Stevens, al-Bakoush said.
More in U.S. compound attack in Benghazi
One man touched his neck to feel for a pulse, and several cried out, “God is great,” though it is unclear if that was in response to Stevens being found alive. There were calls for anybody who knows first aid.
Abdel-Qader Fadl, a freelance photographer who was with al-Bakoush at the scene, told the Associated Press that Stevens was unconscious and “maybe moved his head, but only once.”
“We were happy to see him alive,” Ahmed Shams, a 22-year-old arts student, told the AP. “The youth tried to rescue him. But there was no security, no ambulances, nothing to help.”
The men carried Stevens to a private car to drive him to the hospital since there was no ambulance, all three witnesses said.
Al-Bakoush told D’Agata that Stevens was rushed to the hospital, where he was later pronounced dead.
Stevens and three other Americans were killed in the attack on the consulate, part of a wave of assaults on U.S. diplomatic missions in Muslim countries over a low-budget movie made in the United States that denigrates the Prophet Muhammad.
To watch D’Agata’s report for “CBS This Morning” click on the video player below.
A closer look at U.S. Ambassador Christopher StevensAmbassador killed in Libya served U.S. for 20 years
Last week, the doctor who treated Stevens told The Associated Press that the ambassador was nearly lifeless when he was brought by Libyans, with no other Americans around, to the Benghazi hospital where he worked. He said Stevens had severe asphyxia from the smoke and that he tried to resuscitate him with no success. Only later did security officials confirm it was the ambassador.
There have been disagreements about the attack on the consulate’s offices in Libya and whether they were spontaneous expressions of rage over a blasphemous video, or a pre-planned assault that may have taken advantage of the tumult brought about by the demonstrators.
Comentarios recientes