CPJ research indicates that the following individuals have been killed in 2006 because of their work as journalists. They either died in the line of duty or were deliberately targeted for assassination because of their reporting or their affiliation with a news organization.
See our list of pending investigations into suspicious deaths, called Killed: Motive Unconfirmed.See the list of Journalists Who Disappeared.
CONFIRMED TOTAL FOR 2006: 56
AFGHANISTAN: 3
Abdul Qodus, Aryana TV, July 22, 2006, Kandahar
Qodus, a cameraman for the private station, was killed in a double suicide bombing in the city of Kandahar. He had arrived at the scene of a suicide car bomb when a second attacker with explosives strapped to his body blew himself up, according to the Kabul-based Committee to Protect Afghan Journalists (CPAJ) and news reports. Qodus died of head injuries at a local hospital.
A Taliban spokesman claimed responsibility for the two explosions, which also killed two Canadian soldiers and several civilians, according to international news reports.
Qodus, 25, had worked for the Kabul-based station for eight months, according to CPAJ. Fighting between Taliban militants and U.S.-led coalition forces, which invaded Afghanistan in 2001, had led to the deaths of hundreds of people in the preceding months, according to news reports.
Karen Fischer, freelance, October 7, 2006, Baghlan
Christian Struwe, freelance, October 7, 2006, Baghlan
Fischer, 30, and Struwe, 39, Deutsche Welle journalists doing research for a freelance documentary, were shot in a tent they had pitched along a road near Baghlan, about 95 miles (150 kilometers) northwest of Kabul. Deutsche Welle said the two had recently visited several United Nations Children's Fund projects in northern Afghanistan and were en route to the central province of Bamiyan.
News reports said the pair's personal possessions were not taken. The area, though considered safer than other parts of the country, was still poorly controlled by the government and NATO forces in charge of security.
Local police detained two people for questioning, the Kabul-based daily Cheragh reported on October 12. The Interior Ministry, which led the investigation, said the precise motive was not immediately clear.
CHINA: 1
Wu Xianghu, Taizhou Wanbao, February 2, 2006, Taizhou
Wu, deputy editor of Taizhou Wanbao, died from serious injuries sustained when traffic police in the eastern coastal city of Taizhou, Zhejiang province, attacked him in October 2005 for an exposé that embarrassed them, according to international news reports.
Wu, 41, died of liver and kidney failure after months of hospitalization. State-run Xinhua News Agency reported that the assault had damaged his liver, which was already compromised due to a previously existing medical condition.
On October 20, 2005, dozens of uniformed traffic officers arrived at the offices of the Taizhou Wanbao evening newspaper, assaulted Wu, carried him from the building, and forced him into a police van. The attack stemmed from a report in the previous day’s newspaper on high fee collections for electric bicycle licenses, according to local news reports.
Senior officer Li Xiaoguo was removed from his post for his role in the attack, Xinhua reported in October. Li had called the other police officers to the scene after his demands for an apology for the October 19 report had led to an argument with Wu. “I am not a policeman today,” Li said during the attack, according to local news reports.
Taizhou Wanbao defended the report, saying that it was done in cooperation with local government agencies.
The Hong Kong-based South China Morning Post quoted an unnamed staff member at the Taizhou News Group who said that authorities had prevented local media from reporting on Wu’s death, and that his colleagues believed that criminal charges should be filed in the case.
Journalists who report on local crime and corruption in China’s newly competitive media environment face increasing incidents of violent attack in retribution for their work, according to CPJ research.
COLOMBIA: 2
Gustavo Rojas Gabalo, Radio Panzenú, March 20, 2006, Montería
Rojas, 56, host of “El Show de El Gaba” on Radio Panzenú, was shot by unidentified gunmen on February 4 in the northwestern city of Montería, Córdoba province. He died on March 20 from complications at a hospital in Medellín, capital of the central Antioquia province.
Two men aboard a motorcycle approached Rojas as he opened his car outside a liquor store he owned in Montería. Witnesses said one of the assailants got off the motorcycle, argued with Rojas, and shot him twice at close range, the local press reported. One bullet shattered Rojas’ collarbone, while the other caused severe head injuries.
Rojas underwent repeated surgery for head injuries in Montería, his physician, Jesús Jímenez Isaza, told CPJ. On March 18, Rojas was moved to the Salucoop Clinic in Medellín to receive specialized medical attention, his daughter Erly Rojas said.
Known as “El Gaba,” Rojas had been on the air for more than 30 years. His popular “El Show de El Gaba” featured music, news, and commentary that often focused on government corruption. He had earned a regional reputation for voicing listeners’ social and political concerns.
In April, local police arrested four men in connection with the murder. Luis Armando Díaz Berrocal, the local prosecutor in charge of the case, told CPJ that two were paramilitary fighters. The four denied involvement in the slaying, he said. Díaz said that Rojas’ journalism—especially his criticism of local officials and paramilitary forces—was considered a strong motive. Local reporters also told CPJ that they believe his tough commentary had sparked retaliation.
Atilano Segundo Pérez Barrios, Radio Vigía de Todelar, August 22, 2006, Cartagena
Pérez, 52, host of the weekly program “El Diario de Marialabaja,” was killed by an unidentified assailant who forced his way into the journalist’s Cartagena apartment at around 9 p.m. and shot him twice in the abdomen, a family member told CPJ. The assailant then fled on the back of a motorcycle. Pérez was pronounced dead at the Hospital Universitario del Caribe.
Local journalists said Pérez had been consistently critical of local paramilitary activity. He leased a one-hour, Sunday-morning time slot from Radio Vigía de Todelar for his program, “El Diario de Marialabaja,” Station Manager Doris Jiménez told CPJ. The show focused on news from Pérez’s hometown of Marialabaja, 37 miles (60 kilometers) south of Cartagena.
Ricardo Carriazo, the local prosecutor in charge of the case, told CPJ that Pérez had fled his hometown because of work-related threats. Authorities believed the murder was linked to Pérez’s comments on local paramilitary activities, although they had not conclusively ruled out other motives, Carriazo said.
Jairo Baena, president of a local journalists union, told CPJ that Pérez often denounced government corruption and paramilitary influence in Marialabaja. In his last show, on August 20, he accused the five candidates for mayor of Marialabaja of being financed by right-wing paramilitary groups, the local press reported. The family member told CPJ that Pérez had received recent death threats.
Pérez had been a member of the Marialabaja town council and a deputy in the Bolívar provincial assembly a decade earlier, but he was no longer involved in politics, the Cartagena-based daily El Universal reported. Pérez, while not a lawyer, also provided assistance in legal cases related to the public transportation system, according to the local press freedom group Fundación para la Libertad de Prensa.
Investigators identified two men with links to local paramilitary groups as the likely perpetrators, provincial police Cmdr. Luís Angulo told CPJ. Police found the two men dead a few days after the murder, he said.
INDIA: 1
Prahlad Goala, Asomiya Khabar, January 6, 2006, Golaghat
Goala was murdered near his home in Golaghat district in India’s northeastern state of Assam after writing a series of articles on corruption in the Assamese-language daily Asomiya Khabar that linked local forestry service officials to timber smuggling.
Local journalists told CPJ that police arrested forest warden Zamman Jinnah in connection with the death. He was released on bail. Two other suspects, who were not forestry service employees, were also taken into custody, the journalists said.
Jinnah had made death threats against Goala soon after his articles on corruption in the forestry service appeared, The Assam Tribune reported.
Goala, 32, was riding a motorcycle near his home some 160 miles (260 kilometers) east of the state capital, Guwahati, when he was apparently rammed by a truck. When police arrived at the scene, they found that Goala had been stabbed several times.
Local journalist organizations and civic groups staged a protest in Golaghat on January 10 and called for a full investigation into the slaying.
INDONESIA: 1
Herliyanto, Radar Surabaya and Jimber News Visioner, April 29, 2006, Probolinggo
Reporter Herliyanto was killed by a group of assailants while riding his motorcycle in a forested area connecting the villages of Tulupari and Tarokan in the Banyuanyar district of East Java province. Herliyanto, 40, was stabbed in the stomach, neck, and head shortly after evening prayers, according to the Probolinggo General Hospital’s autopsy report.
Banyuanyar police investigators found the slain journalist’s motorcycle, wallet, camera, and notebook about 100 feet (30 meters) away, according to CPJ sources. Five days later, a villager found and turned over to police investigators the slain reporter’s cell phone with the SIM card missing, CPJ sources said.
On September 26, Probolinggo police arrested three suspects identified as Slamet, 35, Nipa Cipanjar, 27, and Su’id, 50, all of whom were residents of Alun-alun village in nearby Ranuyoso district, according to CPJ sources. Police also publicly identified four additional suspects identified as Juri, Leung, Slamet, and Abdul Basyir, none of whom were immediately apprehended. It is customary for many Indonesians to use only one name.
According to public statements made on September 29 by Probolinggo Resort Police Chief Nana Sudjana, Herliyanto’s murder was directly related to the journalist’s April 9 newspaper report concerning official corruption in a bridge project in the nearby village of Rejing. Herliyanto’s report alleged that 120 million rupiah (US$13,165) was pilfered from a local infrastructure fund, CPJ sources said.
Sudjana accused Basyir, the village official who oversaw the Reijing bridge project, of both planning and participating in the murder. The police official said he drew his conclusions from the statements of the three detained witnesses. Probolinggo police said they recovered Herliyanto’s missing SIM card from a local villager and discovered that Basyir had called him in the afternoon of the day that he was killed.
IRAQ: 32
Mahmoud Za’al, Baghdad TV, January 25, 2006, Ramadi
Za’al, 35, a correspondent for Baghdad TV, was shot during clashes between U.S. forces and Sunni rebels in Ramadi, an insurgent stronghold 70 miles (110 kilometers) west of Baghdad.
Reuters quoted witnesses as saying Za’al was covering an insurgent attack on two U.S.-held buildings when he was wounded in the legs and then killed moments later in a U.S. air strike. The U.S. military denied it had launched an air strike in Ramadi that day and declined comment on the clashes or Za’al’s death, the agency reported.
Staff at Baghdad TV told CPJ that U.S. soldiers briefly questioned Za’al 15 minutes before he was shot.
Staff said several of the station’s correspondents had been detained by U.S. troops in the preceding few months. Baghdad TV is owned by the Iraqi Islamic Party, the biggest Sunni political group. Za’al had worked for the station for one year.
In another case involving combat reporting in Ramadi, Dhia Najim, a freelance cameraman working for Reuters, was shot in the head by a U.S. sniper on November 1, 2004, according to his colleagues.
Atwar Bahjat, Al-Arabiya, February 23, 2006, Samarra
Adnan Khairallah, Wasan Productions and Al-Arabiya, February 23, 2006, Samarra
Khaled Mahmoud al-Falahi, Wasan Productions and Al-Arabiya, February 23, 2006, Samarra
The bodies of correspondent Bahjat, cameraman al-Falahi, and engineer Khairallah were found near Samarra, a day after the station lost contact with the crew, editors at Al-Arabiya told CPJ. Bahjat, 30, was a well-known on-air figure. Al-Arabiya said she had recently joined the channel after working as a correspondent for the Arabic satellite channel Al-Jazeera.
Al-Falahi, 39, and Khairallah, 36, were employees of Wasan Productions who were on assignment for Al-Arabiya. The crew was on the outskirts of the city covering the bombing of the Shiite shrine Askariya, also known as the Golden Mosque.
Al-Arabiya Executive Editor Nabil Khatib said the station lost phone contact with the crew on the evening of February 22. A fixer for Wasan Productions told the station later that armed men driving a white car had attacked the crew after demanding to know the whereabouts of the on-air correspondent.
Munsuf Abdallah al-Khaldi, Baghdad TV, March 7, 2006, Baghdad
Unidentified gunmen in west Baghdad shot al-Khaldi, 35, a presenter for the Iraqi television station Baghdad TV. Al-Khaldi was driving to the northern city of Mosul to interview poets when assailants stopped the car and fired three shots, Baghdad TV Deputy Director Thaer Ahmad said. One passenger was killed and two others were injured. Al-Khaldi presented an educational and cultural show focusing on Middle Eastern poetry.
On March 1, Baghdad TV came under artillery fire by insurgents, according to Ahmad. Four employees were injured by two shells, which hit a parking area. The station had received e-mail threats because of its criticism of insurgent attacks, Ahmad added.
Baghdad TV is owned by the Iraqi Islamic Party, the biggest Sunni political group. Two of its correspondents had been killed by U.S. forces’ fire in the preceding year.
Amjad Hameed, Al-Iraqiya, March 11, 2006, Baghdad
Hameed and his driver Anwar Turki were shot and killed by gunmen apparently affiliated with al-Qaeda in an ambush in central Baghdad. Hameed had been head of programming for Iraq’s state television channel Al-Iraqiya since July 2005.
Hameed, 45, the father of three children, had just left home for work when he was shot several times in the head and chest. Al-Iraqiya, which receives funding from the U.S. government, suspended regular programming and aired verses from the Quran after the widely condemned attack.
Al-Qaeda’s affiliate in Iraq claimed responsibility for the attack in Internet postings, but those claims could not be independently verified. “Your brothers in the military wing of the Mujahedeen Council assassinated on Saturday Amjad Hameed, the editor of Iraqiya ... which always broadcasts lies about jihad to satisfy crusader masters,” said a statement posted on a Web site often used by militant groups and attributed to the group, Reuters reported. According to the statement, the station was “the mouthpiece of the apostate government.”
About two dozen employees of the state-run Iraq Media Network, which includes Al-Iraqiya, had been killed in the war, most by insurgents. Al-Iraqiya offices had repeatedly come under mortar attack.
Muhsin Khudhair, Alef Ba, March 13, 2006, Baghdad
Khudhair, editor of the news magazine Alef Ba, was killed by unidentified gunmen near his home in Baghdad, the third journalist killed in Iraq in a week, Reuters and Agence France-Presse reported.
The shooting took place just hours after Khudair attended a meeting of the Iraqi Journalists Union, which discussed the targeting of local journalists in Iraq, Reuters said. The killing continued two trends in Iraq: The vast majority of victims were Iraqi citizens; and most cases were targeted assassinations.
Kamal Manahi Anbar, freelance, March 26, 2006, Baghdad
Anbar, 28, a freelance journalist and former trainee with the Institute for War and Peace Reporting (IWPR), was killed by Iraqi forces’ fire during a clash with insurgents. The shooting broke out near Al-Mustafa al-Husseiniyah mosque in Baghdad’s Ur neighborhood, according to CPJ sources. Iraqi forces, backed by U.S. military, opened fire after several shots were fired from a building adjacent to the mosque. Civilians rushed for cover, among them Anbar, who was found shot several times in the face and neck, according to IWPR. According to CPJ sources, Anbar was among 16 people killed in the fighting.
Anbar had completed a two-week IWPR course on economics reporting and was writing an article on the displacement of Iraqi families and the volatile housing market. He was at the mosque to interview Sheikh Safaa al-Timimi, head of Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr’s local political movement and an authority on displaced families seeking shelter in Ur, according to IWPR.
So’oud Muzahim al-Shoumari, Al-Baghdadia, April 4, 2006, Baghdad
Al-Shoumari, a correspondent for the Egypt-based satellite channel Al-Baghdadia, was found shot in Baghdad’s southern district of Doura on April 4 by Iraqi police and taken to Yarmouk hospital morgue, his father told CPJ. Al-Shoumari, also know as al-Hadithi (the name of his family’s hometown), was abducted on April 3.
Al-Shoumari was alone when he was seized, and his killers were not identified, sources told CPJ. Abdelhamid al-Sa’eh, director of news at the channel, said he suspected that al-Shoumari, a Sunni Muslim, was kidnapped by elements within the Shiite-dominated Iraqi police, but could not provide details.
Al-Shoumari had worked for Al-Baghdadia for approximately seven months. According to the Los Angeles Times, al-Shoumari regularly confronted Iraqi police about suspicions that they were committing extrajudicial killings. The channel’s Baghdad director, Muhammad Fitian, and al-Shoumari’s father both told CPJ they were not aware of confrontations with the police.
A colleague at Al-Baghdadia said al-Shoumari regularly interviewed authorities about human rights violations and the daily suffering of the Iraqi people. Al-Shoumai did on-camera reporting and anchored a news program.
Al-Baghdadia was critical of the Iraqi government and the U.S. military presence in Iraq, according to The Associated Press. Baghdad’s southern district of Doura was a hotbed of violence, and dead bodies were frequently discovered in the neighborhood.
Laith al-Dulaimi, Al-Nahrain, May 8, 2006, south of Baghdad
Al-Dulaimi, a reporter for the privately owned TV station Al-Nahrain, and Muazaz Ahmed Barood, a telephone operator for the station, were kidnapped by men dressed as police officers at Diyala Bridge. The two were driving home to Madain, a town 12 miles (19 kilometers) southeast of Baghdad, Abdulkarim al-Mehdawi, the station’s general manager, told CPJ.
Their bodies were discovered in Al-Wihda district, 20 miles (32 kilometers) south of Baghdad. Both men, in their late 20s, were shot in the chest, al-Mehdawi told CPJ. Al-Dulaimi had become a reporter for Al-Nahrain four months earlier.
James Brolan, CBS, May 29, 2006, Baghdad
Paul Douglas, CBS, May 29, 2006, Baghdad
Cameraman Douglas and soundman Brolan were killed when a car bomb exploded while they were on patrol in Baghdad with Iraqi and American soldiers. Correspondent Kimberly Dozier, the third member of the CBS crew, was seriously injured in the attack.
The CBS journalists, embedded with the U.S. Army’s 4th Infantry Division, were reporting from outside their Humvee and were believed to have been wearing protective gear when a car packed with explosives detonated, CBS said in a statement. An Iraqi contractor and an American soldier also were killed, and six soldiers were injured, according to news reports.
Douglas, 48, based in London, had worked for CBS News in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Rwanda, and Bosnia since the early 1990s, CBS said. Brolan, 42, also based in London, was a freelancer who worked with CBS News in Baghdad and Afghanistan over the preceding year, according to the network.
Ali Jaafar, Al-Iraqiya, May 31, 2006, Baghdad
Jaafar, 24, a well-known sports correspondent and anchor at Iraq’s state television channel Al-Iraqiya, was shot by unidentified gunmen as he opened up his recently deceased brother’s auto shop near his home in Al-Shorta al-Rabaa in southwest Baghdad, according to CPJ sources and international news reports. His colleagues believe he was killed because he worked for Al-Iraqiya.
Insurgents frequently targeted Al-Iraqiya and its staff because of the station’s ties to the U.S.-supported Iraqi government. About two dozen employees of the state-run Iraq Media Network, which includes Al-Iraqiya, had been killed in the war, most by insurgents. Al-Iraqiya offices had repeatedly come under mortar attack.
Ibrahim Seneid, Al-Bashara, June 13, 2006, Fallujah
Seneid, an editor for the local newspaper Al-Bashara, was murdered in an evening drive-by shooting, Fallujah police Lt. Mohammed Ali told The Associated Press. Insurgents accused the paper of publishing U.S. propaganda, and they demanded its closure in leaflets distributed in Fallujah, AP reported.
Al-Bashara was established following the battle for Fallujah in November 2004, according to a CPJ source. It was perceived by many local residents as a mouthpiece for the United States, the source said.
Adel Naji al-Mansouri, Al-Alam, July 29, 2006, Baghdad
Unidentified gunmen intercepted al-Mansouri, 34, a correspondent for the Iranian state-run Arabic language satellite channel Al-Alam, as he was driving in the Al-Amariyeh neighborhood of western Baghdad, colleague Abdullah Hamdullah Bardan Ruba’i told CPJ. Al-Mansouri was driving to the station’s offices when he was attacked, Ruba’i said.
The gunmen took al-Mansouri’s mobile phone, satellite phone, press card, and money, Ruba’i said. He said his colleague was rushed to a hospital but died shortly afterward. Ruba’i and CPJ sources said they believe al-Mansouri was killed because he was a journalist.
Al-Mansouri, a Shiite, received death threats a year earlier when he resided with his family in Baghdad, where sectarian violence had intensified, according to Ruba’i. The Associated Press reported that the journalist moved his wife and daughter to the Shiite-dominated city of Karbala following the threats, but chose to stay in Baghdad himself. He had dropped off his visiting wife at her parent’s house in Al-Amariyeh around 7 p.m. the night of the attack, sources said.
Ruba’i said he, too, received death threats because he works for Iran’s Al-Alam channel. Al-Mansouri was the first journalist from the Arabic-language Iranian satellite channel to be murdered.
The station, which started regular broadcasting in March 2003, was based in Tehran and run by IRIB, the Iranian state radio and TV service. It was opposed to the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq and, in hourly news bulletins, showed extensive footage of Iraqi civilians lying dead in residential areas or being treated in hospitals.
Riyad Muhammad Ali, Talafar al-Yawm, July 30, 2006, Mosul
Ali, a reporter for the weekly Talafar al-Yawm, was murdered by unidentified gunmen in Mosul’s Wadi Aqab area late at night. The killers took the journalist’s cell phone and the money he was carrying to pay the paper’s printers, Editor-in-Chief Tareq Muhammad Ali told CPJ.
Ali gathered news from official sources, including the police and security forces, and enjoyed good relations with them, his editor said. Insurgents target journalists dealing with official sources, especially the police, he added. Ali, who is also the victim’s brother, spoke with the killers via the stolen cell phone. They said they had killed him because he was an infidel and journalist. Ali described Talafar al-Yawm as pro-Iraqi government and pro-democracy, adding that the paper’s reports had not refered to U.S. forces as occupiers. As a result, he said, the paper had received multiple threats from insurgents.
Mohammad Abbas Mohammad, Al-Bayinnah al-Jadida, August 7, 2006, Baghdad
Unidentified gunmen shot Mohammad, 28, an editor for the Shiite-owned newspaper Al-Bayinnah al-Jadida, as he left his home in the Adil section of western Baghdad to go to work early the morning of August 7, according to The Associated Press and CPJ sources.
Mohammad was highly critical of politicians and Iraqi officials regardless of sect or affiliation, a local source told CPJ. The journalist had received several death threats because he worked for the paper, local journalists said.
Ismail Amin Ali, freelance, August 7, 2006, Baghdad
The body of freelance journalist Ali, 30, was discovered in late evening by police in the eastern section of Baghdad known as al-Sadr City, according to a CPJ source. His body was riddled with bullets, and Iraqi police said they found signs of torture, The Associated Press reported.
A local source told CPJ that the journalist had been abducted while he was at a gas station in Al-Shaab neighborhood of Baghdad two weeks earlier. The kidnappers had demanded ransom, but his family was unable to pay.
A local source said Ali, a well-known Sunni columnist for several Baghdad-based papers, including Al-Sabah and Al-Qarar, may have been targeted because he was highly critical of the Shiite-dominated security forces.
Abdel Karim al-Rubai, Al-Sabah, September 9, 2006, Baghdad
Al-Rubai, 40, a design editor for Iraq’s state-run daily Al-Sabah, was shot by several gunmen while traveling to work in the eastern Baghdad neighborhood known as Camp Sara. The driver of the car was seriously wounded, media sources told CPJ.
Al-Sabah reported two weeks earlier that it had received an e-mailed death threat against al-Rubai and his family, which was signed by the military wing of the Mujahedeen Council, an al-Qaeda affiliate in Iraq. According to the e-mail, the group was angered by the editor’s accusation that they were behind a car bomb attack on Al-Sabah on August 27, which killed a guard and an unidentified man.
“We have our reservations about this newspaper despite the fact that there are Iraqis working in it, but we condemn those false accusations against our resisting army, which issued just a few days ago a statement that forbids the killing of Muslims, especially Iraqis of any background or beliefs. But these allegations and accusations will not go unpunished, and we hold ... al-Rubai responsible for what will happen to him and his family since with the help of God we obtained their names and addresses. We will set an example out of him to those who think of destroying the unity of the Iraqi nation that is fighting the occupation,” the e-mail published by Al-Sabah read.
Insurgents frequently targeted Al-Sabah and other state-run media because of their ties to the U.S.-supported Iraqi government. About two dozen employees of the state-run Iraq Media Network, which includes Al-Sabah, had been killed in the war, most by insurgents.
Safa Isma’il Enad, freelance, September 13, 2006, Baghdad
Enad, 31, a freelance photographer for several outlets including the defunct newspaper Al-Watan, was shot in a photo print shop in Baghdad’s Ur neighborhood, according to the Journalistic Freedoms Observatory, an Iraqi press freedom organization run by local journalists. Two gunmen entered the store on Sabah al-Khayat circle and asked for Enad by his first name, a source told CPJ. When the photographer replied, they shot him. They dragged his body to their car and dumped it east of Baghdad, the source said.
Al-Watan, based in Tikrit, was affiliated with the Iraqi National Movement, a party established in 2001, which receives funds from the United States. The paper closed two months earlier for lack of money and was trying to re-establish itself as a magazine.
Ahmed Riyadh al-Karbouli, Baghdad TV, September 18, 2006, Ramadi
Six gunmen in two cars shot al-Karbouli, a reporter and cameraman, as he chatted with friends after midday prayers outside a mosque, CPJ sources said.
Al-Karbouli, 25, had received numerous death threats from insurgents over the past four months warning him to leave the satellite channel. Baghdad TV is owned by the Iraqi Islamic Party, a major Sunni political group in the country. The party joined the U.S.-backed Iraqi government earlier this year.
Ramadi, 70 miles (110 kilometers) west of Baghdad, forms the southwestern point of the Sunni Triangle, a focus of Sunni Muslim opposition to the U.S. presence in Iraq. Many journalists with Baghdad TV, including the channel’s other correspondent in Ramadi, received death threats, a source at the station said.
Al-Karbouli worked at Baghdad TV for two years covering security and the plight of the residents of Ramadi. According to CPJ sources, his features offended some insurgents in Ramadi. A month earlier, gunmen stormed into his house and threatened him in front of his family.
Hussein Ali, Al-Shaabiya, October 12, 2006, Baghdad
Abdul-Rahim Nasrallah al-Shimari, Al-Shaabiya, October 12, 2006, Baghdad
Noufel al-Shimari, Al-Shaabiya, October 12, 2006, Baghdad
Thaker al-Shouwili, Al-Shaabiya, October 12, 2006, Baghdad
Ahmad Sha’ban, Al-Shaabiya, October 12, 2006, Baghdad
Masked gunmen in at least five vehicles drove up to the fledgling satellite TV channel Al-Shaabiya in the eastern district of Zayouna around 7 a.m., burst into the offices, executed 11 people, and wounded two others. It was the deadliest single assault on the press in Iraq since the U.S.-led invasion in March 2003. Five of the victims were journalists.
Al-Shaabiya is owned by the National Justice and Progress Party, headed by Abdul-Rahim Nasrallah al-Shimari, who was killed in the attack, according to Reuters and CPJ sources. The small party ran in the preceding election but failed to win any seats. Al-Shaabiya had not yet gone on the air and had run only test transmissions. Executive Manager Hassan Kamil told Reuters that the station had no political agenda and that the staff had been a mix of Sunnis, Shiites, and Kurds. The station had not been threatened previously.
Kamil said some of the gunmen wore police uniforms, and all were masked. News reports said the gunmen’s cars resembled police vehicles.
A local press freedom group, The Journalistic Freedoms Observatory, named the dead as Chairman and General Manager Abdul-Rahim Nasrallah al-Shimari and his bodyguard, Ali Jabber; Deputy General Manager Noufel al-Shimari; presenters Thaker al-Shouwili and Ahmad Sha’ban; administrative manager Sami Nasrallah al-Shimari; video mixer Hussein Ali; and three guards identified by first names only: Maher, Ahmad and Hassan. The station’s generator operator, whose name was not available, was also killed. A source at Al-Shaabiya confirmed the names.
Program Manager Mushtak al-Ma’mouri and news chief Muhammad Kathem were hospitalized with multiple gunshot wounds.
Saed Mahdi Shlash, Rayat al-Arab, October 26, 2006, Baghdad
Unidentified gunmen murdered Shlash and his wife as they drove up to their home in Baghdad’s western neighborhood of Al-Aamariyeh, according to Abdullah al-Lamy, former head of the Iraqi Journalists Syndicate.
Al-Lamy, a friend of Shlash, said the journalist was a reporter for Rayat al-Arab, a newspaper associated with the Movement of Arab Nationalists. Shlash often wrote critically about the U.S. occupation of Iraq and called on Iraqis to set religious and political differences aside and unite for a free Iraq. He received several death threats to stop practicing journalism or leave Iraq, al-Lamy told CPJ. Al-Aamariyah neighborhood is an insurgency stronghold where journalists are often targeted, CPJ research shows.
Naqshin Hamma Rashid, Atyaf, October 29, 2006, Baghdad
Unidentified gunmen killed Rashid, 30, a presenter for the Iraqi state television channel Atyaf, and her driver, Anis Qassem, as the two were driving to work near Haifa Street in central Baghdad, according to CPJ sources.
Rashid, a Kurd also known by colleagues as Sherin Rashid, presented Kurdish-language news on Atyaf. Atyaf is part of the Iraqi Media Network and broadcasts in several languages, including Kurdish and English, according to CPJ sources. Colleagues at Al-Iraqiya, the main state television channel, said the murders were part of continued targeting of employees of the Iraqi Media Network.
About two dozen employees of the state-run Iraq Media Network, which includes Atyaf, were killed in the war, most by insurgents.
Muhammad al-Ban, Al-Sharqiya, November 13, 2006, Mosul
Unidentified gunmen shot al-Ban, 58, a reporter and cameraman for the privately owned Al-Sharqiya television station, as he was leaving his home in Mosul’s Al-Nour neighborhood around 8 a.m., according to CPJ sources.
The gunmen used a Russian-made BKC machine gun mounted on the back of a pickup truck, a standard weapon used by Iraqi police and security, a CPJ source said. Four men then got out of the vehicle and shot several more times, the source said. Al-Ban’s wife was wounded in the attack, The Associated Press reported.
According to a CPJ source, al-Ban received several death threats warning him not to cover Kurdish activities in the north. The source said that al-Ban’s last report, on a Kurdish educational festival in Arbil, was done in defiance of the death threats.
Al-Ban worked for three years at Al-Sharqiya and was well known as an experienced journalist, according to a CPJ source. He had also been deputy editor of the leading local daily Al-Masar but had resigned seven months earlier to focus on his work for Al-Sharqiya.
Luma al-Karkhi, Al-Dustour, November 15, 2006, Baqubah
Al-Karkhi, 25, a reporter for the Baghdad-based daily Al-Dustour, was gunned down in the Tahreer neighborhood of Baqubah, northeast of Baghdad, while on her way to work. She stopped at a cell phone shop where several gunmen shot her, a source at the paper told CPJ.
Al-Karkhi had received several death threats from insurgents in Diyala province warning her to stop reporting, the source said. He said she had grown increasingly apprehensive about reporting in the province.
Nabil Ibrahim al-Dulaimi, Radio Dijla, December 4, 2006, Baghdad
Unidentified gunmen killed al-Dulaimi, 36, a news editor for the privately owned station, shortly after he left his home in Baghdad’s Al-Washash neighborhood to go to work, sources at the station told CPJ. The station learned of the killing when a colleague called al-Dulaimi’s home to inquire about the editor’s whereabouts, the sources added. Radio Dijla had been targeted earlier in the year, when a broadcaster was kidnapped.
Aswan Ahmed Lutfallah, Associated Press Television News, December 12, 2006, Mosul
Gunmen killed Lutfallah, 35, an Iraqi cameraman for APTN, as he covered clashes between insurgents and police in the northern city of Mosul. The Associated Press reported that Lutfallah was having his car repaired in the city’s eastern Al-Karama neighborhood when insurgents and police began fighting nearby. He rushed to cover the clash. Police Brig. Abdul-Karim Ahmed Khalaf said insurgents spotted him filming, approached him, and shot him to death, AP reported. Lutfallah had not reported any prior threats against him, the news agency added.
Lutfallah began his career at the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan-backed Kirkuk TV. He then worked for several other local television channels before joining APTN as a cameraman in 2005. Lutfallah is the second APTN cameraman to be killed under similar circumstances in Mosul. On April 23, 2005, cameraman Saleh Ibrahim was killed by gunfire near the city’s Al-Yarmouk Circle, the scene of an earlier explosion that he and his brother-in-law, AP photographer Mohamed Ibrahim, had gone to cover.
LEBANON: 1
Layal Najib, freelance, July 23, 2006, Sadiqeen
Najib, 23, a freelance photographer for the Lebanese magazine Al-Jaras and Agence France-Presse, was the sole journalist to be killed when Israel began attacks on Lebanon in response to a cross-border raid by the Lebanese Shiite group Hezbollah.
Najib was hit by shrapnel from a missile while in a taxi on the road between the villages of Sadiqeen and Qana, according to news reports. Najib, who died at the scene, was trying to meet a convoy of villagers fleeing the Israeli bombardment of south Lebanon.
MEXICO: 2
Bradley Will, freelance, October 27, 2006, Santa Lucía del Camino
Will, 36, an independent documentary filmmaker and reporter for the news Web site Indymedia, was shot at 5:30 p.m. on October 27, while covering clashes between activists of the antigovernment Popular Assembly of the People of Oaxaca (APPO) and armed assailants.
Oswaldo Ramírez, a photographer for the Mexico City-based daily Milenio who was with Will and other Mexican journalists, told CPJ that armed men fired at the protesters. Will, who was standing nearby, was hit in the neck and abdomen.
Will had been covering the conflict in Oaxaca for at least six weeks. He had interviewed witnesses and activists, and shot footage of protests for a documentary on the conflict, the local human rights group, Red Oaxaqueña de Derechos Humanos, said in a statement.
The conflict in the colonial city started May 22, when a strike by the local teachers union sparked a wave of antigovernment protests. After Oaxaca Gov. Ulises Ruiz Ortiz ordered police to disperse protesters with tear gas on June 14, leftist, indigenous, and student groups joined the protests, which became violent. APPO protesters had been calling for the ouster of Ruiz since the confrontation began. Several journalists covering the unrest were beaten and harassed by protesters and by police in civilian clothes, CPJ research showed.
Two local officials were detained in connection with Will’s killing, but they were released within weeks. Mexican press reports said photographs and video footage documented the killing.
Roberto Marcos García, Testimonio and Alarma, November 21, 2006, Mandinga y Matoza
García, a reporter for the Veracruz-based publication Testimonio and local correspondent for the Mexico City weekly Alarma, was found murdered near the town of Mandinga y Matoza.
Traveling by motorcycle from Veracruz to the nearby city of Alvarado, García was run down by a stolen car with Mexico City plates at 1 p.m., the Mexican press reported. Unidentified assailants shot García while he was on the ground, twice in the head and at least four times in the chest, according to press reports and a CPJ source.
Marco Antonio Aguilar Yunes, a regional deputy prosecutor, told the U.S.-based Univisión that authorities found bullet casings from at least two guns at the scene and recovered the attackers’ car.
García had reported for 13 years on violent crime and drug trafficking in Veracruz, a colleague told CPJ. García’s last report, published a week before his death in the bimonthly Testimonio, detailed the activities of a gang of thieves who stole containers coming into the port of Veracruz, the colleague said. Other reporters in Veracruz said that García had previously received death threats on his cell phone.
State police arrested José Cortés Terrones, known as “El Loro,” on December 1. Two weeks before the killing, Cortés allegedly warned García that two men angry with his crime reporting were going to kidnap him, the Veracruz daily El Dictamen reported. Cortés acknowledged he knew García but denied any involvement in the murder, local press reports said.
Cortés’ arrest led to the detention of another suspect, Sergio Muñoz López, known as “El Drácula.” Local press reports alleged that Muñoz was among a group of people who severely beat García three years ago in a work-related attack.
Colleagues told CPJ that they believe the killing was connected to García’s crime reporting. Veracruz’s top state prosecutor, Emeterio López Márquez, told CPJ in December that journalism and other motives were being considered.
PAKISTAN: 2
Munir Ahmed Sangi, Kawish Television Network (KTN), May 29, 2006, Larkana
Sangi, a cameraman for the Sindhi-language KTN, was shot while covering a gunfight between members of the Unar and Abro tribes in the town of Larkana, in southeast Pakistan’s Sindh district, according to local media reports. At least one other person was killed in the clash, which Sangi recorded before he died. KTN broadcast his video.
Police said Sangi was killed in crossfire, although some colleagues believe he may have been deliberately targeted for the station’s reporting on a jirga, or tribal council, held by leaders of the Unar tribe, according to the Pakistan Federal Union of Journalists (PFUJ). An uncle and colleague of Sangi had recently been attacked in connection with KTN’s reports that two children had been punished by the tribal court, PFUJ said.
Mazhar Abbas, secretary-general of the PFUJ, said Sangi’s body was not recovered for several hours after he was shot. The local police chief suspended at least one police officer for negligence, according to media reports. Journalists in Larkana staged a sit-in to protest the killing of their colleague.
Hayatullah Khan, freelance, June 16, 2006, Mir Ali
Khan’s body was found by villagers in the North Waziristan town of Mir Ali, where he had been kidnapped six months earlier. Khan was abducted on December 5, 2005, by five gunmen who ran his car off the road as his younger brother, Haseenullah, watched helplessly. Local government officials and family members said Khan, 32, had been found handcuffed and shot several times. His body appeared frail and he had grown a long beard since he was last seen, Pakistani journalists told CPJ.
The day before his abduction, Khan had photographed the apparent remnants of a U.S.-made missile said to have struck a home in the tribal region’s main town, Miran Shah, on December 1, 2005, killing senior al-Qaeda figure Hamza Rabia. The pictures—widely distributed by the European Pressphoto Agency on the same day they were shot—contradicted the Pakistani government’s explanation that Rabia had died in a blast caused by explosives located within the house. International media identified the fragments in the photographs as part of a Hellfire missile, possibly fired from a U.S. drone.
Khan, who was also a reporter for the Urdu-language daily Ausaf, had received numerous prior threats from Pakistani security forces, Taliban members, and local tribesmen because of his reporting.
During his six-month disappearance, government officials provided Khan’s family with numerous and often contradictory accounts of his whereabouts: Khan was in government custody, soon to be released; Khan had been abducted by “miscreant;” he had been taken by Waziristan mujahedeen; he had been flown to the military base at Rawalpindi and then detained in Kohat air base.
After the body was found, Khan’s relatives were told by hospital workers that he had suffered five or six bullet wounds and that one hand had been manacled in handcuffs typically used by Pakistan’s powerful Inter-Services Intelligence agency. Mahmud Ali Durrani, Pakistan’s ambassador to the United States, dismissed the reported presence of the handcuffs as circumstantial and said the cuffs could have been planted to incriminate the government. No autopsy was performed.
An investigation led by High Court Justice Mohammed Reza Khan was conducted, but the results were not made public. Khan’s family said they were not interviewed by the judge or other investigators. North West Frontier Gov. Ali Mohammad Jan Orakzai told CPJ that North Waziristan was not secure enough to risk exposing a judicial figure to kidnapping or death.
PHILIPPINES: 3
Fernando Batul, DZRH and DYPR, May 22, 2006, Puerto Princesa
Batul, 37, a radio commentator with DZRH and DYPR radio, was shot six times by motorcycle-riding gunmen while he was driving to work in the provincial town of Puerto Princesa on the island of Palawan.
Police officer Aaron Madamay Golifardo was charged in the murder two days later, after being identified by eyewitnesses, according to news reports. In a May 11 broadcast, Batul had criticized Golifardo for allegedly showing a weapon during a disagreement with a waitress in a karaoke bar, according to news reports. Hearings in Golifardo’s trial began in September. The other person on the motorcycle was not immediately identified.
Batul, a former vice mayor, was also highly critical of city government, and his reporting often touched on alleged government corruption and nepotism. In April, two unexploded hand grenades and a threatening letter were left at Batul’s home, according to news reports and CPJ sources. The letter demanded that Batul stop his critical radio broadcasts, and he later told National Bureau of Investigation officials that he thought local police were behind the threat. He also sent text messages and spoke with media colleagues about the threat, CPJ sources said.
Two local journalists who worked with Batul and who were investigating his murder told CPJ that they had been threatened. In June, they said, they fled Palawan due to concerns about their safety.
George Vigo, Union of Catholic Asian News, June 19, 2006, Mindanao
Maricel Vigo, DXND, June 19, 2006, Mindanao
Two unidentified gunmen shot radio journalists George and Maricel Vigo near their home on the southern island of Mindanao. The married couple were walking home from a public market when they were shot at around 5:15 p.m. by men on a motorcycle. They died on the way to the hospital.
George Vigo was a contributor to the Bangkok-based church news agency Union of Catholic Asian News (UCAN) and was active in a local nongovernmental organization that helped rehabilitate internally displaced people. Maricel Vigo hosted a radio program on local station DXND.
The couple’s recent reporting and commentary was considered uncontroversial, according to colleagues and local media groups. But the two had long careers reporting on alleged government corruption and right-wing militias. Offices of a tabloid newspaper founded by the Vigos, The Headliner, were the target of an apparent arson attack in 2001.
The couple had previously been active in left-wing student groups and in recent years had cultivated contacts within the militant Communist rebel organization, the New People’s Army (NPA), as part of their reporting, according to colleagues. In 2003, George Vigo reported on the NPA for a BBC documentary titled “One Day of War,” according to journalist Orlando Guzman, a friend who did reporting for the documentary.
Some of George Vigo’s colleagues believe that the couple’s murder may be connected to a video CD he received from the NPA, which showed a raid on a police station, according to Guzman. He told several colleagues that he had been followed after receiving the video and had expressed fear that military or local officials would target him.
German Doria, the central Mindanao police chief, told reporters that an NPA member had been identified as one of the gunmen and that the killing appeared to be in retaliation for George Vigo’s cooperation with the Philippine military. The Philippine government announced a heightened military campaign against the rebels in early June. An NPA spokesman, however, denied involvement in the killing, according to news reports.
RUSSIA: 3
Vagif Kochetkov, Trud and Tulsky Molodoi Kommunar, January 8, 2006, Tula
Kochetkov, 31, a reporter in Tula, 125 miles (200 kilometers) south of Moscow, died in the Tula city hospital after undergoing surgery for a serious head injury he sustained in an attack two weeks before, according to CPJ interviews and local press reports.
Kochetkov was Tula correspondent for the Moscow daily Trud and a columnist for the local newspaper Tulsky Molodoi Kommunar, reporting on politics, social issues, and culture.
At least one assailant struck Kochetkov on the head with a blunt object and robbed him of a bag and cell phone as he approached his home in Tula on the evening of December 27, 2005, sources told CPJ. The bag was believed to have contained Kochetkov’s passport, press card, credit card, and work-related documents. The attackers did not take Kochetkov’s money or an expensive fur coat he was wearing. When a neighbor found Kochetkov’s bag in her apartment building’s basement, the bag contained everything but the documents related to Kochetkov’s work, according to CPJ interviews with Kochetkov’s parents, Valentina and Yuri, and Lena Shuletova, a friend and colleague.
On the night of the attack, the news agency ANN reported, Kochetkov told his parents he was meeting an unidentified person, after which he would return home to download his work onto his computer. That evening, Valentina and Yuri Kochetkov told CPJ, the journalist called from a local coffee shop and told them that he’d be home in an hour. On the way, he was attacked.
Two neighbors found Kochetkov lying unconscious on the ground at around 2 a.m. on December 28. After regaining consciousness, Kochetkov walked home with the help of neighbors. He did not seek immediate medical attention or report the attack to the police.
Kochetkov was not admitted to the hospital until the next day, when doctors diagnosed him with two hematomas and said his condition was not life-threatening, Yuri Kochetkov told CPJ. Kochetkov’s health began deteriorating January 1. He underwent brain surgery on January 5 and fell into a coma and died three days later. An autopsy showed Kochetkov had suffered a skull fracture, a concussion, multiple chest bruises, and other head injuries, according to press reports and CPJ interviews. Kochetkov never identified his attackers.
The Kochetkovs reported the attack on January 7, and police opened a criminal investigation, the parents told CPJ. By January 9, police said that they had identified a suspect.
On April 3, Tula prosecutors announced they had completed their investigation and determined Kochetkov’s death to be the result of a robbery. That same day, prosecutors filed robbery and manslaughter charges against Yan Stakhanov, a 26-year-old Tula businessman.
Police did not focus on Kochetkov’s work as a motive. Investigators did not question colleagues about Kochetkov’s recent assignments, nor did they look at the reporter’s computer or notebooks for leads. CPJ research shows that Kochetkov had worked on sensitive issues prior to his murder.
Just prior to the attack, Kochetkov wrote an article in Trud on the activities of a Tula drug-dealing group. The December 16 article was headlined, “Revenge of the Mafia?” In June 2005, Kochetkov criticized the aggressive business practices of a local pharmaceutical company in another article.
Journalists at Tulsky Molodoi Kommunar said in late March that Kochetkov had received telephone threats in retaliation for his reporting, the Moscow-based news Web site Newsinfo said. Kochetkov’s colleagues believed that he had enemies, but they said he never shared personal information, the Moscow-based news Web site Press-Attache said.
The trial of Stakhanov opened on April 17 in the Proletarski district court in Tula. Although the trial was said to be open, only one journalist at a time was admitted to the hearings. Officials cited lack of space in the courtroom, Valentina and Yuri Kochetkov told CPJ. Before the trial, Stakhanov allegedly confessed to killing Kochetkov but said later that the confession was coerced, local press reports said. During the trial, prosecutors said the assault on Kochetkov was part of a string of robberies in Tula, according to local press reports. The trial was recessed in September without an immediate date to reconvene, colleague Shuletova said.
Yuri Kochetkov told CPJ that he doubted the attack on his son was a robbery, since only work-related documents and a cell phone were taken.
Anna Politkovskaya, Novaya Gazeta, October 7, 2006, Moscow
Politkovskaya, 48, a journalist renowned for her critical coverage of the Chechen conflict, was found slain in her apartment building in Moscow, according to international news reports. The Interfax news agency, citing police, said Politkovskaya had been shot and that a pistol and four bullet casings had been found.
Politkovskaya, special correspondent for the independent Moscow newspaper Novaya Gazeta, was well known for her investigative reports on human rights abuses by the Russian military in Chechnya. In seven years covering the second Chechen war, Politkovskaya’s reporting repeatedly drew the wrath of Russian authorities. She was threatened, jailed, forced into exile, and poisoned during her career, CPJ research shows.
Igor Korolkov, a colleague, told the Regnum news Web site that Politkovskaya had been reporting on alleged torture in Chechnya for a coming story.
CPJ had named Politkovskaya one of the world’s top press freedom figures of the past 25 years in the fall 2006 edition of its magazine, Dangerous Assignments. In an interview for that profile, Politkovskaya noted the government’s obstruction and harassment of journalists trying to cover the Chechen conflict and pointed to the deadly 2004 hostage crisis in the North Ossetian town of Beslan. “There is so much more to write about Beslan,” she told CPJ, “but it gets more and more difficult when all the journalists who write are forced to leave.”
Politkovskaya was poisoned on her way to cover the Beslan crisis. After drinking tea on a flight to the region, she became seriously ill and was hospitalized—but the toxin was never identified because the medical staff was instructed to destroy her blood tests.
Politkovskaya had been threatened and attacked numerous times in retaliation for her work. In February 2001, CPJ research shows, security agents detained her in the Vedeno district in Chechnya, accusing her of entering Chechnya without accreditation. She was kept in a pit for three days without food or water, while a military officer threatened to shoot her. Seven months later, she received death threats from a military officer accused of crimes against civilians. She was forced to flee to Vienna after the officer sent an e-mail to Novaya Gazeta promising that he would seek revenge.
When Politkovskaya covertly visited Chechnya in 2002 to investigate new allegations of human rights abuses, CPJ research shows, security officers arrested her, kept her overnight at a military base, and threatened her. In October of that year, Politkovskaya served as a mediator between armed Chechen fighters and Russian forces during a hostage standoff in a central Moscow theater. Two days into the crisis, with the Kremlin restricting media coverage, Russian forces gassed the theater and 129 hostages died. Politkovskaya delivered some of the most compelling accounts of the tragedy.
Maksim Maksimov, Gorod, November 30, 2006, St. Petersburg
Maksimov, 41, an investigative reporter for the St. Petersburg weekly magazine Gorod, was declared dead by the Dzerzhinsky District Court in St. Petersburg on November 30, 2006, more than two years after he had been reported missing.
Maksimov was last seen on June 29, 2004, when he went to meet with a source in the city’s downtown district, the business daily Kommersant reported. A month later, police found his car parked near a local hotel. Maksimov’s mobile phone without its SIM card resurfaced at a local flea market at about the same time, according to local press reports.
Investigators and colleagues did not initially focus on Maksimov’s journalism as a reason for his disappearance. At the time, Maksimov was seeking to trade his apartment in downtown St. Petersburg for a bigger one. Colleagues believed that he might have fallen victim to the organized crime gangs that control the real estate market in St. Petersburg, the news Web site Gazeta reported.
For an entire year after the disappearance, police and prosecutors did not report any developments in the investigation. In June 2005, several Russian newspapers reported on the detention of at least three police officers—all senior investigators in the corruption division of the Northwestern Federal District’s Interior Ministry. The three were said to be suspects in Maksimov’s disappearance and suspected murder.
The initial report came from the news agency Interfax and cited an anonymous source in the Northwestern Federal District’s Prosecutor-General’s Office. The report said that investigators believed that Maksimov was murdered for his work as a journalist and that two majors and a lieutenant colonel were considered suspects.
The suspects, Kommersant said, were held on unrelated criminal charges of forgery and falsifying evidence. The English-language daily Moscow Times said that St. Petersburg police confirmed the Interfax report but refused to give further details.
Soon after those reports appeared, however, on June 30, 2005, the Northwestern Federal District’s Interior Ministry issued a statement denying the involvement of the three police investigators in Maksimov’s disappearance. The Interior Ministry said it "considers inadmissible and premature the appearance of press reports, accusing [the officers] of masterminding the murder of journalist Maksim Maksimov." The Interior Ministry gave no information on how the investigation was developing. The statement generated no follow-up by the authorities.
In the absence of official information, speculation about what could have happened to Maksimov continued to circulate in the Russian press.
The St. Petersburg newspaper Smena, where Maksimov worked before joining Gorod, said on June 27, 2005, that it learned from unnamed sources in the St. Petersburg branch of the Interior Ministry that Maksimov disappeared was targeted by high-ranking officers in retaliation for the journalist’s investigation of corruption in the local Interior Ministry. The paper said that the perpetrators, three masterminds and two executors, were in detention.
Kommersant carried a similar story the next day. The paper said investigators believed Maksimov was strangled to death to prevent him from reporting on corruption in the St. Petersburg branch of the Interior Ministry. Several newspapers described in detail what they said happened to Maksimov the day he disappeared, and how he had been killed, but they did not attribute their accounts or explain how they had received the information.
Other reports noted that Maksimov had investigated the murders of several Russian businessmen and politicians, including Galina Starovoytova, a parliamentary deputy shot in her apartment building in 1998.
Authorities have not disclosed further information on the investigation, the identities of anyone held in connection with the crime, or the status of any criminal case. The journalist’s body has not been found.
Rimma Maksimova, Maksim Maksimov’s mother, described her communication with prosecutors in charge of the investigation as "difficult." Maksimova told CPJ that she had received no answer to queries she sent to the Northwestern Federal District’s prosecutor-general’s office and the Northwestern Federal District’s Interior Ministry in St. Petersburg.
On November 24, 2006, Maksimova met with St. Petersburg Gov. Valentina Matvienko who assured her that solving Maksimov’s case was a priority for St. Petersburg’s administration. But the meeting did not result in any developments, and Maksimova told CPJ that authorities stopped answering her queries.
SOMALIA: 1
Martin Adler, freelance, June 23, 2006, Mogadishu
Adler, 47, an award-winning Swedish journalist and photographer, was shot by an unidentified gunman while filming a demonstration in the Somali capital. He was a longtime contributor to Britain’s Channel 4 News. At the time of death, he was freelancing for several newspapers including the Swedish daily Aftonbladet.
An Associated Press reporter who witnessed the murder said the gunman came up from behind Adler and shot him in the back at close range before disappearing into the crowd. Adler died instantly. He was covering a demonstration organized by the Islamic Courts Union, which seized control of Mogadishu on June 5 from warlords backed by the United States. Several reports said he was filming demonstrators burning U.S. and Ethiopian flags. The National Union of Somali Journalists reported that Adler was standing in the crowd, not in the heavily guarded area where many other journalists and Islamic courts leaders were standing.
The rally, attended by thousands, was in support of a peace agreement reached June 22 in the Sudanese capital, Khartoum, between the Islamic courts and Somalia’s transitional government. Demonstrators also protested against suggestions that foreign peacekeepers be sent to Somalia, according to the BBC. Anti-foreigner sentiment had been stoked by reports that some warlords had gotten CIA financing to help capture suspected al-Qaeda members in Somalia. International journalists had been stoned and harassed while reporting on demonstrations, AP said.
In a statement, Britain’s Independent Television News company called Adler “a long-term friend” who had “contributed outstanding journalism and filmmaking.” Adler won many international awards, including the 2001 Amnesty International Media Award, a Silver Prize for investigative journalism at the 2001 New York Film Festival, and the 2004 Rory Peck Award for hard news for a report that that exposed abuses by U.S. troops in Iraq. He had worked in more than two dozen war zones, including Iraq, Afghanistan, Bosnia, Rwanda, Congo, and Sierra Leone.
Adler was born in Stockholm of Anglo-Swedish parents, according to the Web site of the Rory Peck Trust. He left a wife and two daughters in Sweden.
BBC correspondent Kate Peyton, one of several foreign reporters who entered the country to cover the peace process in 2005, was shot dead in Mogadishu in January 2005. Six months later, local radio journalist Duniya Muhyadin Nur was shot dead while covering a protest near the capital. Adler was the 14th journalist killed in Somalia since the fall of former dictator Siad Barre in 1991, according to CPJ research. The country has had no effective central government since that time.
SRI LANKA: 1
Subramaniyam Sugitharajah, Sudar Oli, January 24, 2006, Trincomalee
An unidentified gunman killed Tamil journalist Sugitharajah as the reporter was on his way to work in the eastern port town of Trincomalee.
Sugitharajah, a part-time reporter for Tamil-language daily Sudar Oli, was killed just weeks after he reported on the January 2 killing of five Tamil students in Trincomalee, according to news Web site TamilNet. Military spokesmen initially said that the men were killed by their own grenade in a botched attack on the army, but photographs taken by Sugitharajah showed that the men had died of gunshot wounds. The government ordered a probe into the deaths.
“Mr. Sugitharajah was a fearless reporter and we believe he was killed to demoralize journalists working in the northeast,” Sudar Oli Managing Director E. Saravanapavam told The Associated Press.
The offices of Sudar Oli had been attacked repeatedly in the preceding months. On August 29, 2005, a grenade attack at the printing press killed a security guard. Just days earlier, activists from the People’s Liberation Front (JVP) political party turned over to police a photographer for the newspaper and accused him of spying for the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE). The newspaper and its Jaffna-based sister publication Uthayan came under attack by both LTTE and anti-LTTE forces in political violence.
SUDAN: 1
Mohammed Taha Mohammed Ahmed, Al-Wifaq, September 6, 2006, Khartoum
Masked gunmen bundled Taha, editor-in-chief of the private daily Al-Wifaq, into a car outside his home in east Khartoum late on September 5. Police found his severed head next to his body in an area south of the capital the following day. His hands and feet were bound, according to a CPJ source and news reports.
Taha had angered Islamists by running an article about the Prophet Muhammad. He had also written critically about the political opposition and armed groups in Sudan's western Darfur region, according to press reports. No group claimed responsibility for the killing, Reuters reported.
Taha, 50, was an Islamist and former member of the National Islamic Front. But in May 2005, he was detained for several days, fined 8 million Sudanese pounds (US$3,200), and his paper was closed for three months after he offended the country's powerful Islamists by republishing an article from the Internet that questioned the ancestry of the Prophet Muhammad. Demonstrators outside the courthouse demanded he be sentenced to death for blasphemy. Sudan is religiously conservative and penalizes blasphemy and insulting Islam with the death penalty.
Six months before the slaying, unidentified assailants set fire to the offices of Al-Wifaq, badly damaging the building. The perpetrators were never identified, a CPJ source said.
Several Sudanese journalists gathered at the Khartoum morgue to protest the murder and demand government protection for the press. The Arabic-language satellite news channel Al-Jazeera said Taha had fought many battles with the government and opposition parties over his writings and had made many political enemies.
TURKMENISTAN: 1
Ogulsapar Muradova, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, September 2006, Ashgabat
Muradova, a reporter for the Turkmen service of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL), died in prison sometime in September. Her body was released to her family on September 14, 2006. One Turkmen human rights group that had spoken with relatives said Muradova had suffered head and neck injuries.
Authorities in the capital, Ashgabat, handed over the body only after Western diplomats accompanied Muradova’s children to the morgue, RFE/RL Turkmen Service Director Aleksandr Narodetsky told CPJ. Authorities refused the family’s request for an autopsy and did not disclose the cause or date of death. Security forces later surrounded the Muradova home and prevented people from seeing the body or contacting Muradova’s relatives.
Muradova, 58, had been convicted of possessing ammunition and sentenced to six years in jail after a closed-door trial that lasted only minutes. She had been denied legal counsel.
The Turkmenistan Helsinki Foundation, a human rights organization operating from Bulgaria, released a statement saying that Muradova’s body showed a large head wound and bruises around the neck. The foundation, which also said Muradova had been drugged and tortured in jail, had spoken with her adult children before the telephone connection was abruptly cut. RFE/RL’s Narodetsky also said that the children reported that their mother had a head wound.
U.S. governmentfunded RFE/RL is the last foreign broadcaster to maintain a network of correspondents in the secretive Central Asian state.
VENEZUELA: 1
Jorge Aguirre, Cadena Capriles (El Mundo), April 5, 2006, Caracas
Aguirre, 60, a photographer with the newspaper chain Cadena Capriles, which publishes El Mundo, was shot as he approached an anticrime demonstration in Caracas. He was initially assigned to take pictures of stadium renovations, El Mundo Editor Enrique Rondón told CPJ.
The stadium is near Universidad Central de Venezuela, where demonstrators were protesting the recent killing of three young brothers. The slayings ignited street protests demanding a crackdown on crime, the Venezuelan press said.
After completing the stadium assignment, Aguirre decided to cover the nearby protest. He got into a white Toyota Corolla, provided by El Mundo and marked with the paper’s logo. As Aguirre’s car neared the protest around 3:30 p.m., a man driving a blue Yamaha motorcycle approached. The motorcyclist demanded that driver Julio Canelón stop the car, Rondón said. When Canelón asked why, the motorcyclist responded that he was with the authorities but did not show any identification, the editor told CPJ.
Rondón said the driver did not stop and proceeded to the protest scene. The motorcyclist followed and shot Aguirre four times as he was getting out of the car with his camera. Aguirre managed to take a picture of the killer’s back fleeing the scene on his motorcycle, Rondón said. With the help of bystanders, the driver put Aguirre in the car and took him to a local hospital. The journalist died a few hours later.
Boris Lenis Blanco, a former Chacao police officer, was arrested in the killing on April 13. Members of the national crime police apprehended Blanco when a former colleague identified him as the driver of the motorcycle, the Caracas-based daily El Universal reported. Investigators later searched Blanco’s home and found evidence connecting him to the crime scene, the local press said.
Blanco, charged with murder and impersonation of a public official, went on trial in Caracas in June. Caracas police officer Charly Briceño was held on allegations of covering up the crime.
UNCONFIRMED TOTAL: 30
COLOMBIA: 1
Milton Fabián Sánchez, Yumbo Estéreo, August 9, 2006, Yumbo
Sánchez, 38, a host on local radio station Yumbo Estéreo, was shot three times by a masked assailant outside his home in Yumbo, in southwestern Valle del Cauca province, at around 9:45 p.m., colleague Leonardo Orozco told CPJ. Witnesses said the assailant had been waiting in the bushes behind Sánchez’s home, he said. Sánchez was taken to a local hospital and then to Valle University Hospital in the provincial capital, Cali, before dying at around midnight, Orozco said.
Sánchez was host of three weekly programs. “Notas de Gestión” and “La Personería,” were civic education programs funded by the local government. The third, “Mesa Redonda,” was a community-based opinion program, Orozco told CPJ.
During “Mesa Redonda” broadcasts, Orozco said, Sánchez sometimes criticized the performance of the local government. Sánchez once had been spokesman for the local mayor, according to the mayor’s press office. Orozco said that Sánchez had not mentioned getting threats.
Cali Police Cmdr. José Roberto León told CPJ that a joint investigation with the Cali state prosecutor had been opened. There were no concrete leads, he said.
DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF CONGO: 1
Bapuwa Mwamba, freelance, July 8, 2006, Kinshasa
Mwamba, a Congolese journalist who worked for several local publications, was killed by unidentified gunmen who burst into his home in the capital, Kinshasa. He was shot in the leg and died from loss of blood on the way to the hospital, the local press freedom organization Journaliste en Danger (JED) reported.
Information Minister Henri Mova Sakanyi condemned the killing in an interview with the U.N.-backed Radio Okapi, announcing that he would meet with President Joseph Kabila and other high-ranking government officials “to speed the investigation.” In March, men wearing military uniforms raided Mwamba’s house, stealing a cell phone and $850 in cash, JED reported.
The killing occurred amid campaigning for July 30 presidential and parliamentary elections, the first since independence in 1960. The elections were due to replace a three-year-old transitional government, installed as part of a peace deal to end years of civil war.
ECUADOR: 1
José Luis León Desiderio, Radio Minutera, February 13 or 14, 2006, Guayaquil
León, 43, host of a daily news program “Opinión” on local Radio Minutera, was shot in the coastal city of Guayaquil. León often denounced gang violence and police inaction in the city, Alejandro Alvarez, a reporter for the daily El Universo, told CPJ.
León left his home at 11 p.m. on February 13 to meet his wife, Jenny Piza, at a nearby bus stop, but the two never met. León’s wife and daughter found his body near their home early the next day, February 14. Press reports initially said that León had been shot three times, but his wife told CPJ that León was shot once in the head. He was not robbed.
Piza told CPJ that León had received a text message on his cell phone threatening him with death a few days before his murder. According to Hugo Asencio, news director for the radio program, a few weeks before the murder León had told him that a group of unidentified men hurled stones at his house.
León often reported on gang violence, drug trafficking, and the lack of police in Guayaquil’s suburbs, local press reports said. León also worked at a printing press and was studying journalism, Piza told CPJ.
On March 2, Guayaquil prosecutor Manuel Alvear Hernández ordered the national police to launch an investigation into the murder. The prosecutor asked Radio Minutera to provide audiotapes of the program to investigators. León’s wife and daughter received cell phone death threats after the killing.
In June, three men were accused in the killing, according to El Universo. In a report made public on October 27, local prosecutor Miriam Rosales Riofrío cited insufficient evidence in clearing two of the men. El Universo reported that the third man, Medardo Bone Bone, was held after two witnesses identified him as the gunman. No motive was immediately established.
GUATEMALA: 1
Eduardo Maas Bol, Radio Punto, September 9, 2006, Cobán
Maas, 58, Cobán correspondent for the Guatemala City-based Radio Punto, was found dead at around 4 a.m. in his parked car near the road that connects central Cobán to Guatemala City.
Maas was shot four times, in the head, left arm, back, and chest, local prosecutor Genaro Pacheco told CPJ. The reporter was on his way to his house after driving a colleague home from a party, his brother Félix Maas Bol told CPJ. Pacheco said the journalist’s wallet and gold jewelry were found intact. Maas reported news from the Alta Verapaz region. Félix Maas told CPJ that his brother had not been threatened.
Maas also worked as a supervisor for the Ministry of Education, as a spokesman for the local journalists union, and as a human rights advocate, according to his brother. Until three months prior to his death, Maas had directed the daily news program “Correo del Norte” on local Radio Mía, which he left after a change in the station’s administration, said Eduardo Fam Chun, the vice president of the local journalists union.
Local authorities detained a suspect in September, according to local press accounts. Hugo Pop, a spokesman for the special prosecutor for human rights, told CPJ that a motive had not been determined, but investigators were looking into Maas’ reporting as a possible reason.
INDIA: 1
Arun Narayan Dekate, Tarun Bharat, June 10, 2006, Nagpur
Up to four unidentified men attacked Dekate on June 8 as he was riding with a friend on a motorcycle, according to The Hindu newspaper. He was pounded with rocks and died from his injuries in a hospital in Nagpur on June 10. Dekate was a reporter with the Marathi-language daily Tarun Bharat in Nagpur, central India.
Police did not cite a motive for the attack. Indian media reports said Dekate had recently written articles about illegal gambling in Takalghat village, about 19 miles (30 kilometers) from Nagpur. Takalghat has about 2,500 inhabitants. Dekate also cooperated with police from the nearest town, Bori, in their investigations, which had apparently resulted in several arrests.
IRAQ: 8
Abdel Majid al-Mehmedawi, freelance, May 5, 2006, Baghdad
Al-Mehmedawi, who had reported on social issues, was murdered by unidentified gunmen in Baghdad’s center, according to local sources. The motive for his killing was unknown.
Alaa Hassan, Inter Press Service, June 28, 2006, Baghdad
Hassan, 35, an Iraqi freelance reporter for Inter Press Service (IPS), was killed by assailants who sprayed his car with gunfire as he crossed Baghdad’s Al-Muthana Bridge, a spot notorious for insurgent attacks.
“It appears he was not targeted but was just in the wrong place at the wrong time, part of the senseless violence engulfing Iraq since the U.S.-led invasion in March 2003,” the news agency reported in July.
Hassan had only recently begun freelancing for the news service. He also managed a stationery store, according to Editor Sanjay Suri. Hassan was not on assignment for IPS at the time of his death, Suri said. “The only way from his neighborhood to central Baghdad was to cross the Al-Muthana Bridge over the Tigris River, a regular spot for insurgent attacks,” wrote reporter Aaron Glanz, who worked with Hassan. “Because of an Iraqi police checkpoint and a bend, every car passing over the bridge has to slow down. Killings occur here many times a week.”
Osama Qadir, freelance, June 29, 2006, Baghdad
The body of Qadir, a freelance cameraman who worked occasionally for Fox News and other media organizations in Iraq, was found on or about June 29 with several bullet wounds, according to the Journalistic Freedoms Observatory, a local Iraqi press freedom group.
He had been abducted by unknown assailants in Baghdad about a week earlier. The circumstances surrounding his death were unclear. John Stack, a Fox News vice president, confirmed Qadir’s death but said the journalist was not on assignment for the network at the time of his abduction. He said the station had no indication that the murder was in retaliation for his work.
Hadi Anawi al-Joubouri, freelance, September 12, 2006, Diyala
Al-Joubouri, 56, a freelancer and representative of the Iraqi Journalists Syndicate in the eastern province of Diyala, was ambushed as he drove between Baquba and Khalis, about 125 miles (200 kilometers) northeast of Baghdad, according to the Journalistic Freedoms Observatory. His body was found riddled with bullets.
Azad Muhammad Hussein, Radio Dar Al-Salam, October 10, 2006, Baghdad
The body of Azad Muhammad Hussein, 29, a reporter for the Iraqi Islamic Party-owned Radio Dar Al-Salam, was identified in the Baghdad morgue on October 10, according to the Journalistic Freedoms Observatory, an Iraqi press freedom organization.
The journalist had been kidnapped from Al-Shaab neighborhood in northern Baghdad on October 3. The motive for the abduction and killing was not clear.
Raed Qays, Sawt al-Iraq, October 13, 2006, Baghdad
Unidentified gunmen murdered Qays, a journalist for radio station Sawt al-Iraq, according to CPJ sources. The assailants intercepted the journalist’s vehicle in Baghdad’s northern neighborhood of Al-Dura, the Journalistic Freedoms Observatory reported, citing the independent news agency Aswat al-Iraq.
Qays’ sister, a passenger, was unharmed, the observatory said. Qays, 28, also worked for Radio Sumer, part of the Iraqi satellite network Al-Sumaria.
Ahmad al-Rashid, Al-Sharqiya, November 3, 2006, Baghdad
Al-Rashid, 28, an Al-Sharqiya correspondent, was shot in north Baghdad’s Al-Aathamiya neighborhood, according to CPJ sources. Al-Rashid, who began working for Al-Sharqiya three months earlier, was visiting family when he was stopped by gunmen, asked to exit his car, and shot in front of witnesses, CPJ sources said. Al-Sharqiya is owned by the London-based Azzaman Group, which also publishes the Iraqi daily Azzaman.
Yasin al-Dulaimi, Radio Al-Mustaqbal, December 26, 2006, Baghdad
Al-Dulaimi, a Ramadi-based reporter for the local Al-Mustaqbal Radio, was killed in a bombing in Baghdad's Al-Kahdimiya neighborhood, where his parents lived, according to al-Dulaimi's colleagues. It was unclear whether al-Dulaimi was on assignment at the time. CPJ is investigating the circumstances of al-Dulaimi's death.
MEXICO: 5
Jaime Arturo Olvera Bravo, freelance, March 9, 2006, La Piedad
Olvera, a freelance photographer and former correspondent for the Morelia-based daily La Voz de Michoacán, was shot outside his home in La Piedad in the central state of Michoacán.
Olvera left his home around 8 p.m. with his 5-year-old son. While they were waiting at a bus stop, an unknown assailant approached Olvera and fired at close range, according to local press reports. A bullet struck Olvera in the neck, and he died at the scene. His son was unharmed.
Olvera worked for La Voz de Michoacán until April 2002 when he resigned to become a salesman for a processed meat company, the paper reported. But Olvera continued working as a freelancer, providing photographs and crime tips to local media, the Mexico City–based El Universal said.
Enrique Perea Quintanilla, Dos Caras, Una Verdad, August 9, 2006, Chihuahua
The body of Enrique Perea Quintanilla, a longtime police reporter who became editor of a crime magazine, was found at 2 p.m. on the side of a road about 9 miles (15 kilometers) south of Chihuahua, Eduardo Esparza, a spokesman for the Chihuahua state prosecutor, told CPJ. Perea was shot once in the head and once in the back with a .45-caliber gun.
Perea was editor of a monthly magazine, Dos Caras, Una Verdad (Two Sides, One Truth), which specialized in reporting on closed murder cases and local drug trafficking. He had worked for 20 years as a police reporter for the dailies El Heraldo and El Diario until becoming the magazine’s editor in 2005, his former colleague and editor at El Heraldo, César Ibarra, told CPJ.
Esparza said the journalist was last seen leaving his office in his car at 11 a.m. on August 8, but the car was found abandoned in Chihuahua’s center that night. Perea’s two sons reported the journalist missing.
Esparza said the state prosecutor’s office believed the murder was the work of organized crime. While the motive was not immediately clear, he said, Perea’s journalism was one of the investigation’s leads.
Misael Tamayo Hernández, El Despertar de la Costa, November 10, 2006, Ixtapa
A security guard at the Venus Motel near the southern city of Ixtapa found Tamayo’s body at 7:30 a.m., local police Cmdr. Mario Cruz Gallardo told CPJ. Motel staff said that Tamayo, editor and owner of the daily El Despertar de la Costa in the nearby city of Zihuatanejo, arrived at the motel at about 1:30 a.m., according to local press reports. The car in which he was believed to have arrived left the motel parking lot two hours before the body was found, El Despertar de la Costa reported.
Tamayo had left his office at 9 a.m. the day before, November 9, to have breakfast with the manager of a local bus company, said his sister, Rebeca Tamayo. The editor called the office at 10:30 a.m. to give instructions to a reporter looking into a story on water quality in a nearby town. Tamayo didn’t return to work that day, and he did not answer cell phone calls from colleagues. At 3 a.m. on November 10, Tamayo’s family notified authorities that he was missing.
Ruth Tamayo, another sister, said the local coroner told her that a preliminary autopsy found that her brother died from a massive heart attack. In an interview with CPJ, Ruth Tamayo said she viewed the body and saw what appeared to be three small puncture marks in one arm. Both Ruth and Rebecca Tamayo work at the family-run El Despertar de la Costa.
Tamayo’s family and colleagues said that he was critical of local government corruption and criminal activities. Tamayo’s sisters told CPJ that their brother had received a threatening call from an unidentified individual two months prior to his death, but Tamayo did not take the threat seriously.
José Manuel Nava Sánchez, El Sol de México, November 16, 2006, Mexico City
Nava’s body was found around 9 a.m. by a cleaner in his Mexico City apartment, according to local press reports. Columnist for the national daily El Sol de México and former director of the Mexico City-based daily Excélsior, he had been stabbed at least seven times in the neck and chest. Local authorities told reporters that a number of valuable items were apparently missing from the journalist’s home.
Nava had been Excélsior‘s director from February 2002 until December 2005, when the paper was bought by Grupo Imagen, owner of several Mexican radio stations. Until then, Excélsior had been run by employees as a cooperative. Before taking over as director, Nava had been Excélsior‘s Washington correspondent for 16 years.
In September, Nava began writing the daily column “Nuevo Poder” (New Power) for El Sol de México, said Guillermo Chao, information director for the Mexican Editorial Organization, which owns the daily. Nava’s columns focused on political and social analysis, Chao told CPJ.
On November 6, Nava published a book titled Excélsior, el Asalto Final (Excélsior, the Final Assault), which criticized government officials, Excélsior employees, and business people for their roles in the demise of Excélsior as a cooperative, the local press reported. Nava accused several individuals of dishonesty, The Associated Press quoted Octavio Colmenares, a spokesman for the book’s publisher Libros para Todos Editorial, as saying. Both Colmenares and Chao said that they knew of no threats against Nava.
Authorities believe Nava knew his murderer and that he was killed for personal reasons, according to a spokesman for the special prosecutor for crimes against journalists. The spokesman told CPJ in December that investigators had put aside theories related to Nava’s book.
Adolfo Sánchez Guzmán, Orizaba en Vivo, November 30, 2006, Mendoza
Sánchez, 31, a reporter for the Mexican news Web site Orizaba en Vivo, was found shot to death on the banks of the Blanco River near Mendoza in the southeastern state of Veracruz on November 30.
On November 28, Sánchez and three friends left his home in Orizaba, just east of Mendoza, said Rodolfo Mendoza, administrative director of Orizaba en Vivo. Local authorities found the journalist’s car abandoned the next day.
His body was found with two gunshots to the back of the head. Sánchez had bruises and stab wounds to the chest, a police source in Mendoza told CPJ. Nearby was the body of another man, César Martínez López, alias “El Pollo,” who had also been shot in the head, the source said.
The reporter’s family and colleagues did not know of any threats against Sánchez, who normally covered regional politics, Rodolfo Mendoza told CPJ. Two suspects were detained on December 4. Investigators said the men targeted Martínez because they thought he had stolen their truck, The Associated Press said.
NIGERIA: 1
Godwin Agbroko, ThisDay, December 22, 2006, Lagos
Agbroko, editorial board chairman of the private daily ThisDay, was found shot to death in his car, according to local and international media reports.
The circumstances of the killing were not immediately clear. Several initial reports quoted a ThisDay statement as saying that Agbroko was slain when he encountered the scene of a robbery. CPJ sources were unable to confirm that description; ThisDay later distanced itself from the original statement, saying it would await the results of a police investigation. A police spokesman contacted by CPJ declined to provide details, citing the pending investigation.
Local journalists told CPJ that Agbroko was killed by a single shot to the neck, and that his valuables were untouched.
Agbroko, 53, was a former editor of Newswatch and The Week magazines, as well as the African Guardian which was shut down in 1994 by the military regime of Sani Abacha. In 1996, still under the Abacha regime, Agbroko spent several months in jail for his work. In 1997, PEN American Center awarded him its prestigious Barbara Goldsmith Freedom to Write Award. At ThisDay, he was not only board chairman but also a prominent columnist with a weekly column, “This Nation.” His last column was a political satire on the presidential primaries of the ruling PDP party.
PAKISTAN: 1
Mohammad Ismail, Pakistan Press International, November 1, 2006, Islamabad
Ismail, Islamabad bureau chief for Pakistan Press International, was found on the morning of November 1 near his home in Islamabad with his head “smashed with some hard blunt object,” according to Mazhar Abbas, secretary-general of the Pakistan Federal Union of Journalists. The Associated Press reported that a police investigator said an iron bar may have been used as a weapon.
Ismail, nearing retirement, was last seen the previous night as he was leaving his house to take a walk. Doctors who received the body when it was taken to a local hospital told PFUJ that Ismail had been dead a few hours before being discovered.
Ismail’s family told Abbas that they were at a loss as to what could have prompted the attack. They told him Ismail was carrying little of value when he was assaulted. Ismail’s news agency is not known for particularly critical reporting of the government, CPJ research shows.
PHILIPPINES: 5
Rolly Cañete, freelance, January 20, 2006, Pagadian City
Unidentified gunmen killed radio broadcaster and political publicist Cañete on a busy street in the southern city of Pagadian. International news reports said the attackers fled on a motorcycle.
Cañete was a block-time broadcaster on three radio stations. Two of the stations, DXPA and DXBZ, were controlled by Congressman Antonio Cerilles and his wife, provincial governor Aurora Cerilles, the reports said. Both politicians employed Cañete as their publicist and paid for his radio programs.
Cañete frequently criticized opponents of Cerilles on his daily radio programs, and police believe that his work for the politicians may have been a motive in his killing. Philippine National Police Chief Arturo C. Lomibao told reporters that charges were filed against two suspects.
Cañete leased airtime under a practice known as block-timing, in which commentators also solicit their own advertisers. A number of block-time broadcasters have been killed in recent years.
Orlando Tapios Mendoza, freelance, April 4, 2006, Tarlac
Mendoza, a part-time newspaper editor and columnist, was shot several times by unidentified men as he was returning home in Tarlac, 65 miles (110 kilometers) north of Manila. He was pronounced dead at the scene, according to local media reports.
Mendoza, 58, reported and edited for small local newspapers—the Tarlac Profile and Tarlac Patrol—and wrote several pieces on land disputes before his death, according to the Manila-based Center for Media Freedom and Responsibility (CMFR).
Philippine National Police Chief Arturo Lomibao told reporters that “information on the killing of Orlando Mendoza points to the victim’s involvement in land disputes as the motive for the crime.”
Before Mendoza became a journalist in 1998, he was responsible for implementing the government’s land reform program. Land ownership claims are often highly contested and result in animosity in the Philippines.
Armando Pace, DXDS, July 18, 2006, Digos City
Pace, 51, an outspoken block-time commentator on Radyo Ukay DXDS, was shot in the head and chest by two motorcycle-riding assailants while traveling home from work on a busy street in Digos City on the island of Mindanao. He died shortly after arriving at a local hospital.
On July 20, Digos City police arrested Joy Anticamara in the murder. Police said a young woman witnessed the shooting from 15 to 30 feet away and identified Anticamara in a lineup. Digos City Police Director Caesar Cabuhat said that Pace’s killing could have been “a personal or work-related crime,” according to news reports.
Police investigators also questioned Jesus Saraum, who allegedly owned the motorcycle used in the killing. Isidro Lapeña, Philippine National Police deputy director-general, said blood found on Saraum’s motorcycle matched that of the victim.
Pace was known for stinging radio commentaries that often targeted local politicians. News reports noted that he had been the target of a number of libel lawsuits filed by politicians, business people, and others. Pace purchased airtime from DXDS under a practice known as block-timing, in which the commentators also solicit their own advertisers.
Ponciano Grande, DWJJ, December 7, 2006, Cabantuan City
Two unidentified gunmen killed Grande, 53, a former newspaper columnist and occasional co-host of a radio variety show, at his farm in Cabantuan City, central Luzon. The assailants shot Grande five times and chased his wife, Annie Luwag-Grande, but did not harm her, according to the online news site INQ7 and the National Union of Journalists of the Philippines.
Grande, former director of the Nueva Ecija Press Club, wrote columns for the local weeklies The Recorder and Nueva Ecija Times until 2002, and had recently co-hosted a radio program with his wife on radio station DWJJ.
Grande had retired from writing columns in order to manage the family farm, INQ7 reported. Police were investigating the motive for the attack, according to Deutsche Presse-Agentur.
Andres Acosta, DZJC, December 20, 2006, Batac
An unidentified attacker stabbed commentator Acosta in the town of Batac, 240 miles (390 kilometers) north of Manila. Stabbed in the head and body, Acosta collapsed on his motorcycle while trying to get to a hospital.
Batac Police Chief Bienvenido Rayco told local reporters that the killing might be work-related. “He had been receiving death threats,” Rayco said, without giving further details. He also noted that Acosta had been a witness in a court case and could have been targeted in revenge. Another DZJC commentator, Roger Mariano, was killed in 2004.
RUSSIA: 2
Ilya Zimin, NTV, February 26, 2006, Moscow
Zimin, 33, a correspondent for the national television station NTV, was found murdered in his Moscow apartment. Colleagues went to Zimin’s home on February 27 after the reporter failed to show up for work or answer his phone, according to local press reports. They found his heavily beaten corpse lying face down in a pool of blood and much of the furniture overturned in what appeared to be a sign of a violent struggle, according to local and international press reports.
Medical experts determined that Zimin probably died around 3 p.m. the day before, February 26, as a result of head trauma. The Moscow city prosecutor opened a murder investigation. A laptop computer and cell phone were stolen from the apartment, and a bloody fingerprint belonging to someone other than the victim was found on a light switch, local news outlets reported.
Authorities said the killing was probably not related to Zimin’s work at NTV. Prosecutor Anatoly Zuyev said the murder was most likely a common crime resulting from an argument. He said there was no sign of forced entry, suggesting that Zimin knew his assailant, according to press reports.
NTV News Editor Tatyana Mitkova said she did not rule out the possibility that the murder was linked to Zimin’s work for the station, the news Web site Polit reported. Zimin worked as a correspondent for NTV’s investigative program “Profession: Reporter.” Colleague Vadim Takmenev said Zimin had recently used hidden cameras to prepare an exposé of health violations at expensive Moscow restaurants, Polit reported.
Authorities did not immediately identify a suspect, according to the Moscow daily Kommersant. A concierge at Zimin’s apartment building initially reported that three men with police identifications visited the reporter at 10 a.m. on February 26 and left an hour later, but authorities said they determined the three had visited another apartment in the building, according to Kommersant.
Zimin was assaulted, robbed, and hospitalized with a broken leg in April 2005, but he did not link the attack to his work, the Moscow daily Novoye Izvestiya reported. Born in the far eastern city of Vladivostok, he had worked as a local correspondent for state television GTRK and NTV before moving to Moscow in 2000.
Yevgeny Gerasimenko, Saratovsky Rasklad, July 26, 2006, Saratov
Gerasimenko, a correspondent for the independent weekly Saratovsky Rasklad, was found dead in his apartment in Saratov in southeastern Russia, according to local press reports. Saratov Department of Interior spokesman Denis Zheltov said forensic evidence indicated that Gerasimenko had been killed around 1 a.m., the local television channel GTRK Saratov reported.
Gerasimenko’s mother found the journalist with a plastic bag over his head and multiple bruises on his body. Police found no signs of forced entry, but Gerasimenko’s computer was missing, local reports said. Gerasimenko had been investigating the corporate takeover of a local commercial enterprise, Saratovsky Rasklad Editor-in-Chief Vladimir Spiryagin told the United Volga news Web site.
In November, a regional court in Saratov convicted a local man, Sergei Finogeyev, in the killing and sentenced him to 18 years in prison. In a statement, the prosecutor’s office said the slaying occurred during a robbery.
SRI LANKA: 2
Sampath Lakmal, Sathdina, July 1, 2006, Colombo
The body of freelance reporter Lakmal, a contributor to the Sinhala-language weekly Sathdina, was found in suburban Colombo on July 2. He had been shot after leaving his house to meet a contact on July 1, according to local media reports and the Colombo-based Free Media Movement (FMM).
Lakmal, 24, had gathered news for several media outlets in Colombo, according to FMM. He reported on crime and the conflict between the government and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) rebel group. His colleagues told the Colombo-based newspaper Morning Leader that he had received threats from intelligence agents, Tamil and Sinhalese politicians, and members of the criminal underworld.
Sinnathamby Sivamaharajah, Namathu Eelanadu, August 20, 2006, Jaffna
Sivamaharajah , a Tamil newspaper editor and former member of parliament, was killed outside his home on the besieged Jaffna Peninsula, international and local media reported. Sivamaharajah, managing director of the Tamil-language Namathu Eelanadu, was shot dead in Vellippalai. The motive was unclear.
Sivamaharajah, 68, was a former MP of the Tamil United Liberation Front, and a member of the Tamil National Alliance, a pro-separatist party thought to be the political wing of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) rebels. Namathu Eelanadu was considered sympathetic to the Tamil nationalist cause.
VENEZUELA : 1
Jesús Rafael Flores Rojas, La Región, August 23, 2006, El Tigre
Flores, 66, columnist and Anzoátegui coordinator for the Cumaná-based daily La Región, was shot by an unidentified assailant in front of his house.
At 9 p.m., as Flores and his daughter Nancy were putting their car into the garage, an armed man approached the journalist. The daughter said that she implored the attacker to take their car and money, but the assailant told her that he wasn’t there for either and shot the journalist repeatedly. Flores was struck eight times, in the face, neck, and arm, Luis Marcano Barrios, editor of La Región, told CPJ.
Flores wrote a weekly column in which he often criticized local government officials. Marcano said Flores had told him that he had received several death threats, the most recent coming a month earlier when an unidentified caller told Flores to stop criticizing the municipal government. Family members said they didn’t know of any threats against Flores, the local press reported.
Police Commissioner José Rivero Alfonzo told reporters that the murder appeared to be the work of a professional hit man. Rivero said that police were reviewing Flores’ columns in search of a motive or suspects.