Kidnapped Sudanese journalist beheaded
Sept 6, 2006 (KHARTOUM) — A Sudanese newspaper editor who was kidnapped by unknown armed men was found beheaded on Wednesday, a day after he was reported snatched from outside his home in the capital Khartoum, an Interior Ministry source said.
A photograph showed Mohamed Taha’s body bound at the feet and hands with his severed head next to his body, a Reuters witness said.
He was found on a dirt street in a middle-class residential district of southern Khartoum.
No one has claimed responsibility for the killing.
Kidnapping of civilians is common in Sudan’s war-torn western region Darfur and was a feature in the south during large-scale conflict there, but is very rare in the capital.
“This is very dangerous. It is the start of something terrible. It is an attack on freedom of the press but it will not succeed,” said journalist Maysaun Abdel Rahman, who works for a newspaper aligned with Islamist leader Hassan al-Turabi.
Taha was arrested last year and his al-Wifaq paper closed for three months after it published a series of articles questioning the roots of the Prophet Mohammed, which were condemned by Sudan’s powerful Islamists.
Local papers quoted Taha’s family as saying a group of men bundled him into a car outside his home in north Khartoum and sped off towards central Khartoum on Tuesday.
“His family filed a report saying he was kidnapped last night by unknown armed men,” an Interior Ministry official said.
Dozens of Sudanese journalists gathered at the Khartoum morgue, some sobbing and others with lowered heads. The morgue was guarded by heavily armed police, and the reporters said they feared for the future of journalism in Sudan.
Another journalist, Aziza Abdel Rahman, working for the country’s armed forces magazine said: “The Sudanese press will not be intimidated. We will write our views even more. This will not stop us.”
Taha was an ally of the government, which took power in a military coup in 1989. The government in northern Sudan follows strict Sharia law but has been opposed by some Islamist organisations.
One source in the Islamic community in Khartoum told Reuters that while Taha was in jail last year, he was protected by government soldiers who feared for his life.
(Reuters)