A radio journalist has been shot dead by two unidentified men in Somalia. Abukar Hassan Mohamoud, nicknamed Kadaf, was the manager of Mogadishu-based radio Somaliweyn. Mohamoud was shot five times in the head and chest at his home in Mogadishu on 28 February. Mohamoud, who had been trying to relaunch the radio station which had been shut down by an extremist group in May 2010, died from his injuries in hospital soon after the attack.
An Afghan radio journalist was beheaded on Tuesday night in the southeast province of Paktika, Afghanistan. AFP quoted a local official as saying that Samid Khan Bahadarzai, 25, had been lured to a meeting with unidentified men hours before his body was found near his home in Urgun, a town close to the Pakistan border. Afghan news website Khaama Press reported that the journalist had worked for Mehman Radio, a local station.
Cuban authorities yesterday prevented members of women’s organisation Ladies in White from entering a building in downtown Havana for an event commemorating the second anniversary of the death of activist Orlando Zapata Tamayo. Authorities reportedly diverted traffic from passing in front of the headquarters, stationed police officers in the four corners of the crossroad and checked identification cards of all pedestrians passing through the area.
A Tunisian court today released Nasreddine Ben Saida, general director of the Arabic-language daily Attounissia, who was arrested on 15 February after his newspaper published a photo German-Tunisian footballer Sami Khedira with his naked girlfriend. Rim Boukriba, a journalist for Attounisia, expressed her discontent about the arrest. “He was treated like a criminal … did he kill someone? Is he too dangerous to stay at large?” she said. “The authorities who jailed Ben Saida are seeking to silence us … their problem is not with the picture itself … but with the newspaper, which is popular, and widely read”, she told Index. “The picture is only an excuse,” she added. The court is expected to issue a verdict on the case on 8 March.