Gunmen in Pakistan shot dead a journalist on Wednesday, police said,
less than 24 hours after a technician working for the country's most
popular news channel was killed in a similar attack.
It was
unclear who was behind the shootings in the southern port city of
Karachi, or if they were linked. Police said bullet casings in the
attack on the technician matched those from the recent murders of four
policemen.
"Journalists are being continuously targeted," said
Amin Yousaf of the Pakistan Federal Union of Journalists. "It's time
authorities do something instead of just giving lip-service to the
issue."
Pakistan ranks among the world's most dangerous countries
for journalists, with 14 recorded deaths in 2014, the International
Federation of Journalists has said.
Militant
violence and crime are common in the financial hub of Karachi, which is
home to 20 million people, the country's stock exchange and central
bank.
The military launched a crackdown two years ago on armed
gangs and suspected militants in Karachi, but a recent spate of attacks
has raised questions about its effectiveness.
Police said Aftab
Alam, the journalist killed on Wednesday, was on his way to pick up his
children from school when he was attacked.
"As Aftab Alam came out
of his house, two men on motor-bikes fired shots at him and escaped
from the scene," Feroz Shah, a senior police officer told Reuters.
A former business reporter at news channel Geo News, Alam was unemployed at the time of his death.
Last
year, Hamid Mir, the anchor of a top Geo political talk show, was shot
and injured in Karachi, just weeks after television anchor Raza Rumi
survived an attack in the eastern city of Lahore in which his driver
died.
The Taliban, holed up in mountains on the Afghan border,
have made repeated threats against reporters for portraying the
insurgency in a negative light.
But the security forces and political parties have also been linked to the murders of some journalists.
Wednesday, September 09, 2015
Two media workers shot dead in Karachi
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