A Spanish judge has reinstated an international arrest warrant for three U.S. soldiers on charges arising from the death of a Spanish journalist in Iraq.
Judge Santiago Pedraz filed the warrant Tuesday in a case arising from the 2003 shelling of a hotel in Baghdad in which Spanish television journalist Jose Couso was killed.
The judge first issued an arrest order in 2005 but a court subsequently ruled that Spain had no jurisdiction to try the soldiers. The country's Supreme Court overturned that decision in December and reopened the case.
A U.S. tank fired at Baghdad's Palestine Hotel in April 2003 killing Couso along with a Ukrainian cameraman Taras Portsyuk.
Following the incident, then U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell said the U.S. troops acted in self defense after drawing fire from the hotel.
Some information for this report was provided by AP and Reuters.
