US commanders said their troops had fired a single tank shell at the Palestine Hotel after being shot at from an upper floor.

But European Union officials said they intended to make representations to the United States to provide greater protection to journalists covering the conflict.

Reuters named the dead man as Taras Protsyuk, 35, a Ukrainian national, who who was married with an eight-year-old son.

"Taras's death, and the injuries sustained by the others, were so unnecessary," said Reuters' editor in chief Geert Linnebank.

He called into question the "judgement of advancing US troops who have known all along that this hotel is the main base for almost all foreign journalists in Baghdad."

The injured Reuters staffers were identified as television satellite dish coordinator Paul Pasquale, a Briton, who sustained leg injuries; Lebanese-born Gulf bureau chief Samia Nakhoul, who suffered facial wounds and concussion; and photographer Faleh Kheiber, an Iraqi, with head injuries.

"Doctors treating them (in hospital) said their injuries were not life threatening," the company said.

Jose Couso, a cameraman with the Spanish television channel Telecinco, was also wounded in the leg and jaw in the incident, Telecinco announced during a morning current affairs program.

Reuters has its offices on the 15th floor of the Palestine Hotel which houses most of the foreign media covering the Iraq war.

The 15th and 17th floors of the hotel were struck, blowing out windows as fierce exchanges raged on the 20th day of the US-led war. The 14th floor was also damaged.

A hole had been knocked in the hotel facade, laying bare the metal structure of a column running past a balcony.

Dubai's Al-Arabiya television channel said its bureau on the 17th floor also suffered damage.

General Buford Blount, commander of the US 3rd Infantry Division said a US tank was "receiving fire from the hotel, RPG (rocket-propelled grenade) and small-arms fire, and engaged with one tank round. The firing stopped."

But in Greece, the current president of the European Union, government spokesman Christos Protopapas described the strike as repugnant.

Greek Foreign Minister George Papandreou and EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana had "agreed to make a joint representation to the United States in order to protect journalists," he said.

"Greece condemns this repugnant act and expresses its sorrow and regret."

Earlier Tuesday, Tareq Ayub, 34, of Qatar-based Al-Jazeera television, died after a missile strike on the station's Baghdad offices.

SPACE.WIRE