Al-Jazeera says cameraman died from injuries sustained in Syria

DOHA (Reuters) - A cameraman working for al-Jazeera news network died of his injuries on Monday several days after being shot and wounded in the flashpoint Syrian province of Homs, the Qatari-funded television station said.

"Cameraman Ibrahim Zakaria died a martyr from wounds sustained days ago," al-Jazeera said in a tweet in Arabic, without giving further details on his age or nationality.

Last Wednesday, the Doha-based channel, whose reporting of the 2011 Arab Spring uprisings had won it millions of viewers in the Middle East, broadcast images from a field hospital in Syria of an injured journalist it said had been shot while covering a ceasefire in the town of Talbisa near the city of Homs.

An al-Jazeera spokesperson in Doha declined immediate comment saying a statement would be released later. An al-Jazeera employee confirmed the death and said four of the channel's journalists have been killed covering the war in Syria since 2011.

Homs city and its surroundings have been the scene of intensified fighting between Syrian insurgents and the military in recent weeks, especially around the country's main north-south highway that runs through the city.

The Syrian army and allied militia began a major ground offensive north of Homs city after Russia, main ally of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, started carrying out air strikes in support of the Syrian army and allied fighters two months ago.

U.S. President Barack Obama said on Tuesday that pockets of ceasefire might emerge in parts of Syria, freeing opposition groups from Russian bombings.

(Reporting by Tom Finn in Doha; Editing by Sami Aboudi and Tom Heneghan)

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