Iraq

BAGHDAD: An Iraqi and his wife who both work as journalists for a prestigious Arabic language newspaper escaped assassination in Baghdad's mostly Shiite Karradah district, a media watchdog group said Saturday. Abdul-Wahid Tuma and his wife, Sudad al-Salihi, who work for Al-Hayat were traveling by car Thursday when assailants in two vehicles fired at them, said Ibrahim al-Saraji, head of the...

Siham Mustafa sits behind a radio microphone and clutches a piece of paper. She is ready to fight. Earlier in the morning, al Qaeda in Iraq had hacked her radio station's Web site and posted a letter promising "to kill everyone from Radio Dijla." It was the latest act of aggression against the renegade news and talk radio station that has overcome remarkable odds to remain one of the country's few...

BAGHDAD (AP) — Bilal Hussein’s career as a photojournalist nearly ended soon after it began. Hussein, who had been working for The Associated Press for about three months, volunteered to stay in his native Fallujah as U.S. forces prepared to assault the city to drive out Sunni religious extremists. It was a decision not taken lightly. Once known as the “city of mosques,” Fallujah had become the...

The US military says it will recommend criminal charges against an Associated Press photographer detained in 2006 on suspicion of helping Iraqi insurgents. The Pentagon says additional evidence has come to light proving Bilal Hussein is a “terrorist media operative” who infiltrated the news agency. The case will be passed to Iraqi judges who will decide if he should be tried. AP says its own...

BAGHDAD (AP) — An Iraqi television reporter who was kidnapped in Baghdad last week was freed Monday, his station said. Muntadhar al-Zaidi, a 28-year-old reporter for the Iraqi satellite channel al-Baghdadiyah, was released and appeared to be in good health, according to an editor at the channel who spoke on condition of anonymity because of safety concerns. No ransom was paid, the editor said. He...

BAGHDAD (AP) — An Iraqi television reporter was kidnapped on his way to work in central Baghdad, his station said Saturday, while the U.S. military reported that troops had killed six suspected militants in a raid. Muntadhar al-Zaidi, a 28-year-old reporter for the Iraqi satellite channel al-Baghdadiyah, disappeared Friday, according to an editor at the channel. The editor spoke on condition of...

New York, October 29, 2007—The Committee to Protect Journalists condemns Sunday’s murder in Baghdad of Shehab Mohammad al-Hiti, an editor for the fledgling weekly Baghdad al-Youm. Al-Hiti, 27, was last seen leaving his home in Baghdad’s western neighborhood of Al-Jamia to go to the paper’s offices around mid-day Sunday, a source at the paper told CPJ. Iraqi security forces found the journalist’s...

Omar Fekeiki, a 28-year-old Iraqi citizen studying journalism at UC Berkeley, was at his campus apartment when he received news that chilled his heart: His friend and Washington Post colleague Salih Saif Aldin had been murdered while on assignment in a Baghdad neighborhood. Just two weeks before, Aldin, 32, had called Fekeiki to thank him for being a good mentor. "He died for us to get the story,"...

An Iraqi correspondent of the US-funded Radio Free Europe/ Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) has disappeared. Her driver’s body was found after she went missing Monday in Baghdad. Two RFE/RL correspondents have already been killed since the start of the year. The female correspondent worked for Radio Free Iraq, the Arabic language service of RFE/RL that broadcasts to Iraq from RFE/RL headquarters in Prague...

Reporters Without Borders today called on the Iraqi authorities to urgently establish a programme for protecting journalists after an armed group put a price on the head of public TV station Al-Iraqiya’s correspondent in Diyala, an eastern province where at least six journalists have been murdered. “It is vital that the Iraqi authorities at least try to guarantee the safety of journalists,” the...