Al-Hiti, 27, an editor for the fledgling weekly Baghdad al-Youm, was last seen leaving his home in Baghdad’s western neighborhood of Al-Jamia to go to the paper’s offices around midday, a source at the paper told CPJ. Iraqi security forces found the journalist’s body later that afternoon in Baghdad’s northeastern Ur neighborhood and transported it to Baghdad’s Al-Tib al-Adli Hospital morgue, the source said.
A local journalist told CPJ that Ur neighborhood is adjacent to Baghdad’s Sadr City, controlled by the Mahdi Army, led by radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr. The CPJ source said that he was not aware of any prior death threats against the journalist. Baghdad al-Youm had been publishing for only three weeks.