JUBA: Gunmen in South Sudan have shot dead a radio journalist in the war-torn
eastern state of Jonglei, coll eagues said Friday.
Pow James Raeth, a
correspondent for the independent Radio Tamazuj, was shot dead along with a
friend in the town of Akobo by unknown gunmen as they walked to access Internet
from an office, the station said.
The station quoted local government
commissioner Tut Chol Rial as saying the killing was "not intentional" but was
crossfire between two warring rival groups.
"We condemn the senseless killing
of Pow James Raeth, somebody who was working for peace and for educating and
informing the public," Radio Tamazuj said in a statement.
The station called
him a "talented and hard-working young man who showed so much promise."
The
U.S. embassy in Juba offered their "sincere condolences to the friends, family
and colleagues" of Raeth.
Reporters Without Borders ranks South Sudan as the
125th worst nation out of 180.
Rights groups have repeatedly warned that
security forces have cracked down on journalists, suffocating debate on how to
end a civil war in which tens of thousands of people have been killed in the
past 17 months.
Fighting broke out in December 2013 when President Salva Kiir
accused his former deputy Riek Machar of attempting a coup, setting off a cycle
of retaliatory killings a cross the
country.
http://www.dailystar.com.lb/News/World/2015/May-22/298941-south-sudan-journalist-shot-dead-radio-station.ashx
