Al-Nuaimi, a presenter for the Iraqi TV channel Al-Mosuliya, was shot dead by unknown gunmen near her home, the station said. Al-Nuaimi, 20, covered women and you this sues for the station and was attending Mosul University as a student in the media department.
Omar Ghazi, deputy administrative manager for Al-Mosuliya, told CPJ that the assailants attacked al-Nuaimi as she arrived at her home after returning from school. Her mother saw two young gunmen on motorbike flee the scene, Ghazi said.
Ghazi said there was no doubt that al-Nuaimi was killed because she worked at Al-Mosuliya. He told CPJ that several journalists had decided to quit the station because they felt they were in danger after Bashar al-Nuaimi, their colleague, was murdered. They also felt that they lacked serious protection from the government.
Bashar al-Nuaimi, the station’s cameraman, was shot dead by unknown gunmen outside of his home in October. Murad Ghazi, the deputy manager of Al-Mosuliya, told CPJ at the time that the channel had been targeted by a smear campaign that accused it of serving U.S. interests.
Militant groups like the Al-Qaeda-affiliated Islamic State in Iraq and Sham have historically targeted journalists in Mosul whom it considers collaborators with the U.S.-backed Iraqi government, according to CPJ research.
With the resurgence of militant groups across the country, there has been a spike in general violence in the country as well as a rash of journalist killings in Mosul.
According to the Iraqi Journalistic Freedoms Observatory, Iraqi security forces recently discovered a purported assassination list of 44 journalists during a raid on abuilding in Mosul that housed militants. It is not clear if any of the most recent killings were related to this list, but several journalists in Mosul say anti-government militants are targeting journalists considered supportive of the government.