Gunmen fatally shoot local journalist in southern Somalia

By JERUSALEM POST STAFF
Gunmen in southern Somalia fatally shot a local journalist who had been a contributor to various news organizations including The Associated Press and the British Broadcasting Corp., his wife and a doctor said Saturday. Nasteex Dahir Farah, 26, was shot several times in the chest in the southern port city of Kismayo, said Dr. Mohamed Aden Dheel of Kismayo Hospital. He died at the hospital, Dheel said. "His death is the total destruction of my life," Farah's wife, Idil Farey, told the AP. She is six months pregnant with the couple's second child, she said. Their oldest child, a son, is 10 months old. Somalia, which has been mired in chaos and violence since 1991, is among the most dangerous countries in the world for journalists. At least nine other journalists have been killed in Somalia since February 2007, according to Amnesty International. Farah, who was the vice chairman of the National Union of Somali Journalists, had occasionally contributed news reports, photographs and television footage for the AP from Kismayo since 2006. He was not known to be working on a story on Saturday.