Some savage and gruesome murders of global journalists in recent history

LAHORE: While the incumbent Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan has claimed that the late Saudi journalist, Jamal Khashoggi, was "brutally murdered," numerous leading British media outlets like the "Mirror" and "Sky News" have revealed that the newsman’s body had been "cut up," his fingers were "severed" and face was "disfigured," with remains found in the garden of the oil-rich Kingdom’s Consul General's home in Istanbul.

Here follow brief details about some of the most brutally killed global journalists, who were sent to their graves with utmost impunity by their inhuman and barbaric killers: Quite recently, on October 8 this year, a 30-year-old Bulgarian journalist, Viktoria Marinova, who reported on an investigation into an alleged corruption scam involving European Union funds--and linked to big businessmen and politicians--had been raped and murdered in the border town of Ruse on the bank of Danube River, according to "The Guardian." She presented a current affairs talk programme called "Detector" for Ruse’s small private "TVN Television." Bulgarian Prime Minister, Boyko Borissov, had said: "The best criminologists were sent to Ruse, let’s not press them. A large amount of DNA had been obtained."

Meanwhile, the country's Interior Minister, Mladen Marinov, had stated there was no evidence to suggest the murder was related to Marinova’s work: "It is about rape and murder. There is no information that she had been threatened." Between August 21 and November 29, 2017, a freelance Swedish journalist Kim Wall's dismembered body parts were found in different locations around Copenhagen. Her headless body was found by a cyclist. Police said Wall's torso had washed up on a beach. On October 6, 2017, assisted by dogs, local police divers had found two plastic bags containing Wall's head, legs, clothes and a knife. A post-mortem examination found 15 stab wounds, mostly in the groin.

In January 2018, according to the indictment published by Scandinavia's reputed print media houses, a Danish inventor Peter Madsen had reportedly tied up and abused Kim Wall, before murdering her on board his home-built submarine. Madsen planned the murder by bringing items, including a saw and screwdrivers, which were used to hit, cut and stab Wall while she was alive, the prosecutors said. Prosecutors added she died by strangulation or cutting of her throat. The killer, Madsen, had admitted dismembering journalist Wall on board his submarine and dumping her body parts in the sea, but denied sexually assaulting her, "The Guardian," the "New Zealand Herald" and a Norwegian newspaper "Aftenposten" had reported.

Kim Wall, a 30-year-old freelance journalist who was researching a story on the entrepreneur and aerospace engineer, went missing after Madsen took her out to sea in his 17-metre submarine in August 2017. On April 25, 2018, Madsen was charged with her murder, and was convicted and sentenced to life imprisonment by Copenhagen City Court following a widely publicized trial. On October 7, 2006, a female Russian journalist, Anna Politkovskaya, was murdered in the elevator of her block of flats. In June 2014, five men were sentenced to prison for the murder, but it is still unclear who ordered or paid for the contract killing. She had been shot twice in the chest, once in the shoulder, and once in the head at point-blank range. A strong critic of the Kremlin, she had received death threats following her outspoken reports documenting torture, mass executions and kidnapping by the military during the conflict in Chechnya.

After Politkovskaya became widely known in the West, she was commissioned to write a 290-page book "Putin's Russia (later subtitled Life in a Failing Democracy), a broader account of her views and experiences after former KGB lieutenant colonel Vladimir Putin became Boris Yeltsin's Prime Minister, and then succeeded him as President of Russia, "The Guardian" and "The Times" had reported. Noted American journalist, James Wright Foley, was abducted in November 2012 in northwestern Syria and beheaded in August 2014, purportedly as a response to the US airstrikes in Iraq, renowned French newspaper "Le Monde" had revealed. He was working for the Paris-based Agence France-Presse (AFP) and "GlobalPost."

In February 2002, eminent American newsman, Daniel Pearl, was kidnapped and later beheaded by Al-Qaeda stalwarts inn Pakistan. Based in Mumbai, he was working as South Asia Bureau Chief for the "Wall Street Journal" and had both American and Israeli citizenship. According to the "CNN," at a closed military hearing in Guantanamo Bay (Cuba) in March 2007, top Al-Qaeda leader, Khalid Sheikh Muhammad, had claimed that he had personally beheaded Pearl. On October 7, 2006, Christian Struwe and Karen Fischer, who worked as freelance documentary filmmakers for a renowned German media outlet "Deutsche Welle," were murdered in their tent on the fifth anniversary of the beginning of the US-led Afghan War. They were believed to be on their way to see the Buddha statues in Bamyan province. These statues were destroyed under the Taliban. They were the first foreign journalists killed after the 2001 US-led invasion in Afghanistan. The two journalists had pitched a tent off to the side of the road to sleep for the night. Around 1:30 a.m., from four to six armed men with AK-47 rifles approached their tent and shot them. Their rented car also was shot, according to the "Reuters" and the "Deutsche Welle." Christine was pregnant at the time she was killed.

The two journalists happened to be killed on the same day as Russian journalist Anna Politkovskaya was murdered in Moscow. In June 2007, two local women journalists were killed in Afghanistan. These included reporter Zakia Zaki, who was shot seven times in the head and the chest as she slept with her eight month-old son. Zakia worked for the Afghan Radio "Peace." Zakia was the first Afghani journalist to speak out against the Taliban. The "BBC News" had reported that two of her six children were also in the same room, but left unharmed. Zakia's 8-month-old son was in bed with her but it was her older son who called her husband and informed him of his mom’s death. The other was female journalist, Shakaiba Sanga Amaj, was located in Kabul and worked for the "Shamshad" TV channel.

Amaj was 22 years old. Her murder had taken place on June 1, 2007, less than a week before Zakia's killing. Syed Saleem Shahzad, an investigative Pakistani journalist, was tortured to death in May 2011. He wrote widely for leading European and Asian media. He served as the Pakistan Bureau Chief of the "Asia Times Online" (Hong Kong) and Italian news agency "Adnkronos." "The New York Times" and "Asia Times Online" had reported that in 2006, Saleem was kidnapped by the Taliban in Helmand in Afghanistan. Then, his kidnappers had accused him of being a spy, but had set him free after seven days.

Shahzad had reportedly disappeared on the evening of May 29, 2011 in Islamabad. He had reportedly left his home around 5:30 pm local time that evening to take part in a TV show scheduled for 6:00 pm, but at 5:42 pm, his cell phone was switched off and he failed to arrive at the television bureau. On the next day, his family members from Islamabad confirmed that he was dead, with police stating that his body had been found in a canal near Mandi Bahauddin (Punjab). In 2009, a radio journalist Uma Singh was hacked to death by a criminal gang in Nepal. Uma Singh had broadcast and written about women’s rights and the caste system, as well as political issues. In 2011, two women journalists were found murdered in a Mexico City park. The bodies of Ana Marcela and Yarce Viveros, the founders of a political magazine, were discovered by joggers. Their killings followed a pattern of murders by organized crime gangs and drug cartels.

  It is imperative to note that on June 21, 2016, the "New York Times" had revealed: "At least 1,195 journalists have been killed because of their work since 1992, including several this month. In those identified as murders, prosecutions have occurred in only 13 percent of the cases. In at least 787 cases, journalists have been directly targeted for murder, according to the "Committee to Protect Journalists." That number excludes journalists killed in combat and on other dangerous assignments. The group has found only 34 cases in which everyone has been convicted." The prestigious American newspaper had asserted: "At least 88 percent of all journalists killed were covering stories in their own countries. Nearly all were men, although at least 80 female journalists have died. At least 40 percent of those murdered had been threatened. The deaths of media workers, who include translators, drivers and guards, have been tracked since 2003. At least 55 have been killed in Iraq. However, there is quite less information about the links between their deaths and work than there is for journalists. Iraq leads the list of 97 countries where journalists have been killed for doing their work. At least 149 local and 23 foreign journalists have been killed there."