BAGHDAD - A local reporter for one of Iraq's main independent newspapers was kidnapped and killed, his paper announced on Monday, the latest in a series of assaults on local journalists covering the war-torn country.
"Al-Zaman newspaper mourns the loss of our colleague Ali Khalil who was assassinated yesterday in the Al-Bayaa neighbourhood hours after he was kidnapped while leaving a relative's house," the paper said.
Khalil, 22, leaves behind a son "not yet a week old and a wife crushed by the assassination of her husband," it added.
The Sunni-owned daily newspaper announced the death on its front page, placing a black ribbon in the corner in mourning for Khalil.
Two Iraqi journalists working for the American television network ABC were killed in the same neighbourhood earlier this week while they were on their way home from work.
At least 170 journalists and media professionals have been killed in the fighting that has gripped Iraq since the March 2003 US-led invasion, according to the watchdog Reporters without Borders.
Another two are missing, and at least 12 have been kidnapped, according to the organisation's website.
The vast majority of the victims have been Iraqi journalists killed by death squads and insurgent factions angered by their coverage or ideologically opposed to their employers, whether Iraq or foreign.
Others have been caught in the crossfire of conflicts between US and Iraqi forces, insurgent groups and militias and some have disappeared after being taken into custody by groups in security force uniforms.
Earlier this month gunmen killed four Iraqi journalists working for a US-backed local newspaper in northern Iraq when they ambushed the minibus they were travelling in.
05/21/2007 10:16 GMT