Naji, 28, a cameraman for Associated Press Television News, was found in a Baghdad morgue with a gunshot wound to the back of the head, six days after he had gone missing.
The journalist left his home in southwest Baghdad’s Ashurta al-Khamsa district for work on the morning of December 30, 2006, AP reported. His wife, Sahba’a Mudhar Khalil, reported him missing that evening, the news agency said. The circumstances surrounding his death were unclear, according to AP. A coroner’s report could not pinpoint a date of death, a CPJ source said.
The source said Naji had received telephone threats a year previous, prompting him to move his family to a safer location. Naji also worked as a messenger for the news agency.
Naji was the second AP employee killed in less than four weeks. On December 12, 2006, Aswan Ahmed Lutfallah, 35, was gunned down by insurgents while filming clashes between Iraqi police and insurgents in the northern city of Mosul.