Reuters Describes Hotel Bombers Only as 'Militants'

Reuters, the wire service who doesn't like "emotive" words in their dispatches like "terrorist," since they compromise "editorial integrity" and endanger reporters, is at it again Wednesday in reporting a truck bombing at a hotel in Peshawar, Pakistan. Reporter Robert Birsel used the word "militants" 11 times in the story, and never used "extremist" or "terrorist."

This anti-emotive words policy is not universal, however, since as James Taranto pointed out, Reuters recently found it okay to characterize Bush in emotive words as a "belligerent, Muslim-hating cowboy." (In that story, al-Qaeda was merely a "militant network.")

Birsel began by noting someone let security barriers down outside the hotel just before the attack and then added:

Taliban militants have stepped up attacks in cities since the army launched a campaign in April to clear Taliban fighters from a stronghold in Swat and other parts of northwest Pakistan.

More than 1,300 militants and 105 soldiers have been killed in Swat, and the army's resolve has heartened U.S. officials, who have been worried that nuclear-armed Pakistan could slide into chaos unless the Taliban's advance weren't stopped.

Birsel and Reuters also made no reference to "radical Islam" -- or any kind of Islam.  

(Hat tip: Motherbelt)