We owe thanks to Sid Hastings, a former photo editor at the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, for alerting us to another change in the military’s policy on photos of slain personnel in eastern Afghanistan.  Hastings pointed out the update in a comment to an item posted Thursday on the Editors’ Desk.

Hastings directed us to an article — Ground Rules On “Killed In Action” Photos Revised Again — on the National Press Photographers Association web site.

From that article by Donald R. Winslow of News Photographer magazine:

BAGRAM AIR FIELD, AFGHANISTAN (October 15, 2009) - The U.S. military Regional Command East today significantly modified their rules governing whether embedded journalists can or cannot photograph or videotape U.S. military personnel who are killed in action after it was reported yesterday that photographing KIAs while embedded had been banned.

“In order to further clarify the command’s intent to protect the privacy and propriety of our service members who are killed or mortally wounded in action, Regional Command East (RC East) has modified Rule 14 of its ground rules,” U.S. Army Master Sgt. Thomas Clementson, a spokesman for Regional Command East, told News Photographer magazine today.

Yesterday, RC East confirmed that it had indeed banned journalists who are embedded with their forces in eastern Afghanistan from videotaping or photographing soldiers who are killed in action, a dramatic change in policy from the previous embed agreements which allowed such photographs to be published (but only after the Department of Defense had successfully notified the KIA’s next of kin).

Today, Clementson issued a modified embed agreement and said that the “update” was to “better synchronize RC East media ground rules with those of our higher headquarters.”The KIA photo ban RC East had confirmed only yesterday was clearly spelled out in the embed agreement’s Item #14:

• “14. Media will not be allowed to photograph or record video of U.S. personnel killed in action.”

Clementson told News Photographer magazine today that RC East’s new embed agreement was again modified so that Item #14 now reads:

• “14. Media will not be prohibited from viewing or filming casualties; however, casualty photographs showing recognizable face, nametag or other identifying feature or item will not be published. In respect to our family members, names, video, identifiable written/oral descriptions or identifiable photographs of wounded service members will not be released without the service member’s prior written consent. If the service member dies of his wounds, next-of-kin reporting rules then apply. Media should contact the PAO for release advice.

“The modification issued today from Regional Command East, Joint Task Force-82, at the Bagram Media Center came after their additional review, Clementson said.

The initial change in the embed rules banning photographing KIAs - and then today’s “modification” - came only a few weeks after a Pentagon uproar - raised chiefly by Secretary of Defense Robert Gates - after the Associated Press distributed a picture of U.S. Marine Corps Lance Cpl. Joshua M. Bernard when he was mortally wounded by a rocket-propelled grenade that was fired against him by insurgents during a battle in Afghanistan’s Helmand province.