PARIS (Reuters) - A French freelance photographer working in Syria has died after being hit by shrapnel while covering an opposition group for Reporters Without Borders, the French government said on Sunday.

Olivier Voisin was following the operations of an armed opposition group near Idlib, in northwestern Syria, Reporters Without Borders said.

Voisin, born in 1974, was taken to the international hospital in the Turkish border city of Antakya but subsequently died from wounds to his head and arm, the office of French President Francois Hollande said in a statement.

(Reporting by James Regan; Editing by Stephen Powell)