A freelance journalist was shot dead near Iraq's northern city of Kirkuk on Monday, less than 24 hours after a reporter for the Washington Post was killed in Baghdad.
Dhi Abdul-Razak al-Dibo, a 32-year-old freelance reporter, was killed in an ambush by unidentified gunmen Tuesday near the city of Kirku, 180 km north of Baghdad. His two bodyguards were injured in the attack.
Saif Aldin, an Iraqi reporter employed by the Washington Post bureau in Baghdad, was shot Sunday in the south Baghdad neighbourhood of Sadiyah. His newspaper said he had gone there to interview residents about violence between Shiites and Sunnis. His body was found in the street covered with newspapers. Police who went to the scene said he was shot at close range in what appeared to be an execution-style murder. He was killed by a single shot to the forehead.
Their deaths, according to Reporters sans Frontières (RSF), bring to 205 the number of journalists and media assistants killed in the course of their work in Iraq since the start of the US-led invasion in March 2003.
“There is not letup in the violence on the ground and Iraqi journalists are continuing to pay dearly,” RSF said. “Eighty-eight per cent of the media workers killed in Iraq in the past four years have been Iraqi. Those working for foreign news media are in even greater danger. With Saif Aldin, 10 in this category have been killed since the start of the year.”
Aged 32, Saif Aldin had worked for the Washington Post since 2004. In Monday's issue, the newspaper said he received threats in 2005, when he was working in his home town of Tikrit, and that as a result the newspaper transferred him to Baghdad. In 2006, a 35,000-euro bounty was said to have been placed on his head after he reported that officials in Tikrit had looted a former palace.
RSF called on Iraqi authorities to carry out a thorough investigation and arrest those responsible for Saif Aldin’s murder. "It took place in broad daylight in front of dozens of witnesses, so there is no good reason for it to go unpunished.”
“We condemn this deplorable attack, which is a fresh reminder of why Iraq remains the most dangerous place in the world for journalists, especially Iraqis,” Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) Executive Director Joel Simon said. “Accounts that Salih Saif Aldin may have been murdered by Iraqi soldiers are alarming, and they demand swift action by the Iraqi government in providing answers and ensuring those responsible are brought to justice."
Washington Post Baghdad Bureau Chief Sudarsan Raghavan told CPJ that it remained murky as to who shot Saif Aldin and why. Some residents suspect that the Iraqi army, some of whose members are loyal to the Mahdi Army, a militia led by radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, is responsible for the slaying, the Post reported. Iraqi police suspect Sunni gunmen from the Awakening Council, a group consisting of Sunni tribes working alongside US forces, the newspaper said.
According to RSF, 54 journalists and media assistants have been killed in Iraq since the start of the year. Ten of them worked for foreign news media (Radio Free Europe, Newsweek, ABC, APTN, Reuters, New York Times and Washington Post).
CPJ's parameters for listing press freedom violations are slightly different. CPJ says 119 journalists, including Saif Aldin, and 41 media support staffers have been killed in Iraq since the US-led invasion, making it the deadliest conflict for the press in CPJ’s 26-year history. About 85 per cent of media deaths have been Iraqis.
