BRITIAN:The BBC's longest-serving foreign correspondent, Charles Wheeler, has died after a 60-year career during which he reported on Watergate, Vietnam and the Gulf War. He was 85.
Colleagues described him as the greatest journalist of his generation and paid tribute to his bravery and humility.
"To audiences and to his colleagues alike, Charles Wheeler was simply a legend," said BBC director general Mark Thompson.
"His integrity, his authority and his humanity graced the BBC's airwaves over many decades."
Born in Bremen in Germany in 1923, Wheeler started his career in journalism as a copy boy on the Daily Sketch newspaper in 1939.
He joined the Royal Marines at the outbreak of the second World War and served undercover in Europe.
After the war, he joined the BBC World Service, reporting from Spain, Germany and India. As the BBC's Washington correspondent, he covered five presidential elections, the Vietnam war and the civil rights movement. - (Reuters)