NEW YORK -- CNN chief news executive Eason Jordan resigned late Friday after controversial remarks that initially claimed U.S. troops targeted journalists in Iraq.

In a memo to CNN employees, Jordan said he made his decision "to prevent CNN from being unfairly tarnished by the controversy over conflicting accounts of my recent remarks regarding the alarming number of journalists killed in Iraq."

Jordan, a 23-year veteran of CNN who oversaw much of the channel's breaking-news coverage since the late 1980s, has been an advocate for journalists' safety, particularly during the Iraq war. But it was his comments during a session last month during the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, that led him into trouble. The story was initially reported on a Florida businessman's blog and picked up by blogs before it exploded onto the mainstream media this week.

Jordan wrote that he wasn't clear in his comments during the Jan. 27 panel discussion, where he reportedly said that 12 journalists had been targeted and killed by U.S. troops in Iraq.

"I never meant to imply U.S. forces acted with ill intent when U.S. forces accidentally killed journalists, and I apologize to anyone who thought I said or believed otherwise," Jordan wrote.

Jordan was challenged about his assertion and according to witnesses, he backpedaled and clarified his remarks, during the panel discussion and afterward.

But Jordan's remarks have caused a firestorm of criticism that has moved from hundreds of blogs through the conservative press and into the mainstream media.