Syria has recently witnessed the murder of a number of journalists, activists, and media professionals working in the war-torn country where battles waged between the regime and the rebels get more violent by the day.
The Arabic Network for Human Rights Information holds the Syrian regime criminally responsible for the continued targeting of journalists and other media professionals reporting from within Syrian territories.
Syria recently witnessed the murder of a number of journalists and activists during their coverage of the battles waged between the regime and the Free Syrian Army (FSA). Syrian activist Mohamed Osama Khasawneh was killed on 20 May 2013 in the city of Dara’a. He was reporting on the situation when a bomb fell on the media center in the city.
On 4 May 2012, Zaher Khraibah, a media activist known as ‘Abu Hekmat’, also died in Dara’a while covering clashes during which the FSA was trying to gain control of the Shbrak barrier in the city. Khraibah was arrested many times by the regime’s forces for supporting the revolution.
Mohamed Abdulghani El-Khalaf was killed on 2 May after being targeted along with a group of media professionals during their return from the province of Idlib in Northern Syria. He was killed by a bomb and two others suffered severe injuries. A day earlier, Mohamed Rafik Atwan was killed as well in Der El-Zour.
In a related act that demonstrates the regime’s continued violations against journalists, the authorities arrested German journalist Armin Wertz in Idlib on 5 May and sent him to a prison in Lattakia, President Bashar Assad’s hometown.
“The targeting of media professionals and journalists is a clear violation of press freedom and a failed attempt by the regime to create a blackout regarding the violations committed against the Syrian people, both by the regime and the rebels,” said ANHRI.
