March 23, 2014
BAGHDAD,— An Iraqi journalist was shot dead by a Kurdish presidential officer at a checkpoint in Baghdad on Saturday as he went to work, provoking protests by other journalists and a promise by Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki to arrest the perpetrator.
A Kurdish Peshmerga presidential guard in Baghdad has shot dead the head of Radio Free Iraq radio station, for allegedly not stopping at a checkpoint, adding fuel to a burning feud between Kurdistan and Iraq center over oil and budget issues.
Muhammad Bidaiwi Shammari, an Iraqi university professor and journalist, was shot dead by a Peshmerga lieutenant attached to a guards unit for Iraqi President Jalal Talabani, who is ethnically Kurdish.
According to Ziad al-Ajili, head of the Journalistic Freedom Observatory, Shammari was killed after he refused to stop at a checkpoint. The victim was a journalism professor and head of Radio Free Iraq in Baghdad.
"I was watching the cars passing through the checkpoint when a quarrel occurred between a driver and a soldier ... suddenly, two soldiers came and dragged the driver from his car and began to beat him," a man who identified himself as Riyadh and an eyewitness at the scene told Reuters.
"The driver pushed one of the soldiers away but a lieutenant came and shot him dead in the head".
Badawi's body was left at the scene for hours as dozens of Iraqi journalists gathered to protest his killing and demand the arrest of his killer.
Troops and army humvees surrounded the presidential compound in preparation to arrest the killer, but Iraqi security forces said Kurdish troops refused to hand him over.
Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki went to the scene, kissed the victim's body and vowed to arrest the killer.
Twenty minutes later, the commander of the Baghdad security operations center said the killer had been detained and state televisionwww.Ekurd.net broadcast footage of an officer it identified as the perpetrator.
Dozens of journalists came out to Hurriya Square holding the body of Badawi wrapped in a red blanket and chanting: "No no to Kurds, No no to Kurds".
Badawi was a father of five.
"Iraq is the second most dangerous country in the world for journalists," said Ibrahim al-Saragi, the head of the Iraqi Journalists Rights Defense Association. "There is a legislative vacuum inside Iraq to protect journalists and unfortunately, the targeting of journalists in Iraq is taking place on a daily basis, due to the lack of a mechanism to protect them".
Tensions rose at the scene after the shooting, and are likely to worsen the already blazing rows between the Kurds and the Shiite Arab-led government in Baghdad over oil and the budget.
As the incident unfolded, the office of President Talabani, who himself has been absent from Iraq and in Germany since a stroke in December 2012, released a statement promising full cooperation with the law, and the handover of the guard to Iraqi authorities.
“What happened is against the values on which the special presidential guards have been trained,” read the statement. “In the past years, the guards have insisted on performing their tasks professionally and holding human rights in high esteem,” it said.
Maliki’s media advisor, Ali al-Mussawi, told Rudaw that the government insists on prosecuting the guard, and would release the outcome of its investigation and proceedings.
The incident came as the Kurdistan Region announced it will resume oil exports of 100,000 barrels a day via the Iraqi pipeline network starting on April 1, as a “goodwill gesture” toward resolving a bitter oil and budget dispute with Baghdad.
Copyright ©, respective author or news agency, Reuters | rudaw.net | Ekurd.net
Sounds very bad, Obviously the peshmergas could not feel their own life threatened. He had overreacted. That seems to be a real homicide.
In Iraq dozen of journalists are killed every year and Iraqi government and Justice do not care. But in THIS case, it could be used in a political aim.
I've red that Hero Talabani called Maliki after the arrest.
Posted: Sat Mar 22, 2014 3:49 pm