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Alert

Murder investigation stalled five months after death of community radio director Zakia Zaki

(RSF/IFEX) - The following is an abridged version of a 5 November 2007 RSF press release:

Reporters Without Borders has condemned the lack of progress in the Afghan official investigation of Zakia Zaki's murder. The head of radio station Sada-e-Sulh (Peace Radio) was killed exactly five months ago.

Police have arrested six suspects but released four. The security forces have not made any serious investigation that could lead to the arrest and conviction of the killers and the family and colleagues of Zakia Zaki fear that the authorities may have abandoned the investigation altogether, the worldwide press freedom organisation said.

At least three men broke into her home in Jabalussaraj, Parwan province, north of Kabul, overnight on 5-6 June 2007 and fired seven bullets in front of her two-year-old son.

Zaki, who also ran a school, used to say of the radio station that it was a "community home for the residents, the only place where they dared to express themselves freely". The journalist and her staff were regularly threatened by local warlords.

"At the time of her death, the interior minister called her murder an 'act of terror' and promised that those responsible for it would be punished, but today nothing or almost nothing has been done," said the organisation. "It is the duty of the authorities in Kabul to carry out a real investigation so that the murder of this courageous and excellent woman should not go unpunished."

To read the full statement, see: http://www.rsf.org/article.php3?id_article=24265