Iraq arrests suspect in killing of Iraqi employee of US-supported TV channel
ERBIL (Kurdistan 24) – The Iraqi Interior Ministry announced that it had arrested and charged a suspect with the Jan. 9 murder in Baghdad of an Iraqi employee of a US-based Arabic-language television station.
At the time, local media reports quoted sources as saying that "armed individuals" killed Samer Ali, an assistant cameraman for Alhurra-Iraq, a satellite news channel headquartered in central Baghdad.
Police later found the body of Ali lying on the side of an eastern highway of the capital that overlooks the sprawling Sadr City neighborhood.
On Thursday, ministry spokesman General Saad Maan said in an interview with Alsumaria News that "the murderer of the assistant photographer of Al-Hurra channel in Baghdad has been arrested." He gave no further details about the arrest, the suspect's identity, or whether his motives are suspected to be in connection with Ali's employment.
On the day of the killing, sources told Kurdistan 24 that Ali had sustained multiple gunshots to the head and said that police had opened an investigation into the incident and had taken his body to a forensic facility. Other sources specified that the attackers had, after shooting him, taken his money and car.
The Iraqi Center For Supporting Freedom of Speech condemned the killing at the time, calling on Iraqi Prime Minister Adil Abdul-Mahdi to "urgently" open a "real" investigation into the case to bring the "criminals to justice."
Iraq remains one of the most dangerous countries in the world for media workers and journalists, with media rights organizations reporting that at least 455 Iraqi journalists have been killed since the fall of the former Iraqi regime in 2003.