Unidentified armed men shot
Hassan, a reporter and producer for the private Radio Maanta, three times in
the head near a high school in Yaqshid District in Mogadishu, according to news
reports. The assailants fled before the police arrived at the scene, news reports
said.
Hassan had worked as a journalist since 1989 and contributed
to Radio Mogadishu and the broadcaster GBC, according to local news reports. He
had covered a suicide bomb attack the day before at a popular café frequented
by journalists and civil servants, according to local journalists and news
reports. At least 14 people died in the blast, including three journalists,
news reports said.
Local journalists told CPJ that the identities of the gunmen
were not clear, but news accounts citing local journalists reported
that the attacks were happening in government-controlled areas. “So it could be
Al-Shabaab or another militia, or even former government officials,” said one
journalist who spoke to CPJ on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisal. It
is not clear why Hassan would have been targeted.
In March 2013, a Somali military court convicted Adan Sheikh Abdi
Sheikha Hussein of Hassan’s murder and sentenced him to death. Adan was accused
of being a member of Al-Shabaab. A court rejected his appeal in July and upheld
the death penalty, according to news reports and local journalists. A firing
squad executed Adan, 24, on August 17, 2013, news
reports said.
While several local journalists supported the
court’s decision, some noted concern about whether the accused received due process of law. The military
trial was closed to the public and was
based on laws dating from the authoritarian regime of former President Siad
Barre.