Iraq

Press freedom groups have condemned journalist Hilal Al-Ahmadi’s murder Thursday in the northern city of Mosul. Ahmadi, who worked for two local weeklies, the Mosul Echo and Iraqiyoun, was gunned down outside his home. “We are extremely shocked and dismayed by Ahmadi’s death,” Paris-based press freedom group Reporters sans Frontières (RSF) secretary-general Jean-François Julliard said. “The...

President of the Kurdistan Democratic Party Massoud Barzani has announced in an interview with the pro-KDP daily Khebat that he is to withdraw a complaint made by his party against two columnists on the non partisan newspaper Awene, Marwan Wrya Qani’ and Aras Fatah, over their article that appeared in June 2010, “What did the president of the autonomous region of Kurdistan say?” Paris-based press...

Massoud Barzani, the president of the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) and head of the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) voiced clear support for media freedom during his party’s congress on December 13 but in recent months more and more lawsuits have been brought against the Kurdish media, and not just the independent ones. Newspaper editors nowadays seem to be spending their time in the...

Journalist and presenter on the satellite TV channel al-Anbar Omar Rassim al-Qayssi died on Sunday of injuries he suffered in a booby-trap car bomb in al-Anbar city centre, Ramadi, 167 km east of Baghdad). Paris-based press freedom group Reporters sans Frontières (RSF) hopes that an investigation will be opened and those responsible will be brought to trial. The press freedom organisation said it...

Paris-based press freedom group Reporters sans Frontières (RSF) and the Journalistic Freedoms Observatory (JFO), its partner organization in Iraq, have condemned the threat of a wave of Al-Qaeda bombings against news media that has just been reported by the Iraqi interior ministry. Asking not to be named, a ministry official said on November 30 that Al-Qaeda was planning a campaign of car-bombings...

Al-Baghdadia, an Iraqi satellite TV station that has its headquarters in Cairo, has announced that it is ending all activities in Iraq as a result of a decision by the Iraqi government’s Communications and Media Commission (CMC) on November 1 to suspend the operations of all its bureaux, according to Paris-based press freedom group Reporters sans Frontières (RSF). “In view of the prime minister’s...

Mazen Mardan al-Baghdadi, a reporter for Al-Mosuliya television, was gunned down on Sunday in front of his home, according to news reports. The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) called on Iraqi authorities to thoroughly and transparently investigate the murder. Three armed men showed up at the journalist's house on Sunday at 6 p.m. and told al-Baghdadi's father they were with military...

Iraqi authorities have decided to close down Al-Baghdadia TV offices in Iraq. The closure of the Cairo-based satellite channel was announced after it broadcast the demands of gunmen who attacked a church in Baghdad on Sunday, the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) has reported. Fifty-eight people were killed during the siege, according to news reports. On Monday, security forces...

Freelance cameraman Tahrir Kadhim Jawad, 27, was killed Monday in a rising trend of fatal attacks on journalists in Iraq, according to the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ). Jawad died instantly after a bomb attached to his car exploded in Garma, 50 miles west of Baghdad in volatile Anbar province, according to local press freedom groups and online news reports. Jawad was...

Alaa Mohsen, the host of the programme “Liqa Sakhen” on state-run Al-Iraqiya television, was badly injured by a bomb placed underneath his car as he was about to leave his home in the Baghdad suburb of Saydiya on the morning of September 27 to go to work. Rushed to the Yarmouk district hospital, he was reported to be in a critical condition Tuesday, according to Paris-based press freedom group...