Unidentified gunmen killed journalist Rahmo Abdukadir on March 24th in Mogadishu. The journalist, who worked for the private radio Abduwaq station, was gunned down by two men while she was heading to her home at Suuq Bacaad marke of Yaaqshiid neighborhood on Sunday evening.
Witnesses said, the gunmen approached the reporter and fired at her five times before running away. “There was another girl who accompanied the victim, but the gunmen did not target her; she ran away screaming for help,” told Issa Mohamed, one of the witnesses.
“We do not know why she was killed but we are in shock,” said Abdikarin Ahmed, director of Radio Abduwaq, where Abdukadir worked.
Abdukadir is the third journalist to be killed in Somalia this year. Abdihared Adan, a journalist working for the Shabelle Media Network, was shot dead in January near his house in Mogadishu. He led campaigns that criticised the government. Another reporter, Mohamed Nuxurkey, was killed in a suicide bomb blast outside the national theatre.
Eighteen journalists were killed in Somalia last year by bombs and gunmen. The Doha Centre for Media Freedom said that the situation for journalists “continues to deteriorate. ” As long as journalists’ murderers remain unpunished Somalia’s media will keep on suffering, which will have serious consequences for the nation as a whole,” a spokesperson stated.
Press freedom watchdog Reporters Without Borders reported 2012 as the “deadliest year” on record for Somali journalists, surpassing 2009 when nine of them died.
Earlier in March, journalists in Somalia claimed they were threatened at gunpoint and beaten by police as they tried to cover a court case in Mogadishu.
The lack of press freedom garnered worldwide attention after Abdiaziz Abdinur Ibrahim interviewed an alleged rape victim, Lul Barake, and both were sentenced to one year in prison.
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