Popular Pakistani journalist shot dead by Kenyan police
A senior Pakistani journalist and TV host Arshad Sharif was shot dead Sunday night along the Nairobi-Magadi highway in what police termed a "mistaken identity," writes africanews.com.
According to local media reports, Sharif was shot in the head and killed by police after he and his driver allegedly breached a roadblock that had been set up to check on motor vehicles on the route.
His driver was also injured in the incident.
They were driving from Magadi town to Nairobi when they were flagged down at a roadblock being manned by a group of police officers, police said.
According to police, at the roadblock, the police were supposed to intercept a car similar to the one Sharif and his driver were driving, following a carjacking incident in the Pangani area, Nairobi where a child was taken, hostage.
Sharif had left the country first for Dubai and later London in August after his channel parted ways with him, without citing any specific reason, following the ouster of former Prime Minister Imran Khan through a no-trust vote in April.
Sharif and other ARY officials were charged with sedition over a controversial interview with Shahbaz Gill, a leader of Khan's Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf party, which was broadcast on the channel in August. Gill was later arrested and released on bail.
Meanwhile, Kenya's Independent Police Oversight Authority (Ipoa) says it has launched investigations into the killing of Pakistani journalist Arshad Sharif.
Its head, Ann Makori, has told journalists in the capital, Nairobi, that a rapid response team has been sent to investigate the killing of the journalist.
Sharif was known to be a staunch supporter of Khan and openly criticized the alleged role of state institutions in his ouster.
As IMI reported, an Algerian court handed a death penalty sentence to journalist Abderrahmane Semmar known as Abdou Semmar.
Help us be even more cool!
