Another journalist was gunned down in Iraq today, prominent Al-Iraqiya television anchor, Riad al-Saray. According to Iraqi police al-Saray was ambushed by gunmen using silencers outside his car. The Committee to Protect Journalists wrote of al-Saray, “[He] hosted programs that sought to reconcile Shiites and Sunnis.”
Two weeks after President Obama formerly announced the end of America’s interminable “combat mission” Iraq is still the deadliest country in the world for journalists — casualties of reporting and truth-telling there dwarf those in similarly conflict-ridden countries likeColombia, Algeria and Philippines. According to a report released by Reporters without Borders today, 230 journalists have been murdered in Iraq since the US invasion in March 2003. That’s more than in any other conflict since World War II.
It makes one wonder about our newest escalation in Afghanistan and the dangers facing reporters in that warzone, about what level of collateral damage will finally become too much to bear.
UPDATE 9/9/10: Another Iraqi television anchor has been murdered. This is the second killing in as many days. According to the Committee to Protect Journalists, Safa al-Din Abdel Hamid was killed Wednesday in a drive by shooting outside his home. An anchor with Al-Mosuliya, a private television channel based in northern Iraq, Abdel Hamid hosted a program on the historic roots of religious sites in Mosul. He is survived by six children.