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The military raid to free the British-Irish journalist Stephen Farrell from his Taliban captors was successful in the narrowest possible sense. The rescuers got Mr Farrell out of the hands of his kidnappers in Kunduz, northern Afghanistan. But the raid should be no cause for celebration. Two Afghan civilians are said to have died in the operation. And Mr Farrell's Afghan interpreter, Sultan Munadi, was shot dead, quite possibly by Nato forces.

Much remains hazy about the raid, not least the question of who ordered it. The Ministry of Defence will only say that it was a Nato operation. But the death of a British soldier implies that UK forces were heavily involved. Whatever the truth, the rescue attempt was justified. Independent journalists on the ground in places...