Two state media employees killed in past five days

Reporters Without Borders today condemned the murders of two employees of the state-owned Iraqi Media Network (IMN) in the past five days. Raad Jaafar Hamadi, a journalist with the daily Al Sabah, was killed on 22 November in Baghdad. Fadhila Abdelkarim, a member of the administrative staff of the local TV station Nainawa, was killed yesterday in Mosul (370 km north of Baghdad). “Journalists and other employees of the Iraqi public media, including the Al Iraqiya TV station, are often the victims of violence by people hostile to the government,” the press freedom organisation said. “The main communication tool of the Iraqi authorities, these media are seen as government mouthpieces and have suffered a heavier toll in casualties that the other media since the start of the war.” Hamadi was killed in the east Baghdad neighbourhood of Al-Washash when his car was fired on by four gunmen in another vehicle, which immediately took off. Abdelkarim was shot dead by gunmen outside his home in the Al-Wahda district of Mosul, Iraq's most dangerous city for the media after Baghdad. Iraq's biggest media group with more than 3,000 employees, the IMN was created by the coalition forces after taking Baghdad in 2003. Many journalists working for the IMN have received threatening letters telling them to quit. A total of 137 journalists and media assistants have been killed in Iraq since the start of the war in 2003, while 51 have been kidnapped. Four of the kidnap victims are still being held hostage.