TANK, Pakistan: Unknown gunmen shot dead a local journalist in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa’s Tank district on Tuesday, indicating how much insecure journalists are in the insurgency-hit country.
The police source said that the journalist Dr Muhammad Zaman Mehsud was traveling in his car from Gomal Bazar area to Tank when two miscreants riding a motorcycle opened fire on his vehicle on North Waziristan road.
The journalist sustained series injuries and later succumbed to his wounds while being taken to District Headquarters Hospital (DHQ) Dera Ismail Khan.
Zaman Mehsud was a senior journalist who also served as the president and secretary general of the Tribal Union of Journalists’ South Waziristan chapter.
At least 114 journalists and media workers have been killed in Pakistan since 2000 including 13 in Federally Administrated Tribal Areas (FATA) and 23 in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, according to a research conducted by Pakistani media development organization Freedom Network.
Last month, a two-day training program was organized in Peshawar by Freedom Network in collaboration with United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), during which journalists including females from FATA and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province received training sessions on safety and security to stay safe while reporting for their respective national and international news organizations in the region.
