US officials confirm two police officers shot in Ferguson

WASHINGTON - Two police officers in the flashpoint US town of Ferguson were shot early Thursday during a new protest over the treatment of blacks by the mainly white police force, an office said.

One officer was shot in the face and the other in the shoulder as a protest rally outside the police station in the Missouri town was dispersing, St. Louis County police chief Jon Belmar told reporters.

"The police officers were standing there and they were shot. Just because they were police officers," Belmar told reporters at the scene of the incident, adding that the officers were alive and conscious.