Somali Journalists Syndicate (SJS) strongly condemns the act of the police who shot and endangered the lives of two journalists working for Radio Kulmiye. They were on a reporting mission in Mogadishu on Wednesday morning when police officers at Daljirka security checkpoint shot at Abdullahi Hussein Anshur and Mohamed Abdulkadir Jirow. The two were filming the car bomb scene on Wednesday morning. Both were fortunately unhurt.
“Around 10.25am my cameraman and I, went to the blast scene to film it. Upon reaching the scene, we saw dead and injured people and we became part of the first responders helping victims. We started to interview eyewitnesses at the scene when a police officer shot at us several,” said journalist Abdullahi Hussein Anshur, who spoke with Somali Journalists Syndicate (SJS).
Their equipment and mobile phones were confiscated by the police and were also held against their will and were refused to communicate with their families. However, both were released one hour and a half later.Both of them were unable to go back to their radio station due to the injuries they had sustained.
According to both journalists, the police officers who were from Waran Unit ordered the journalists to stop interviewing eyewitnesses the blast scene. “SJS condemns in the strongest terms possible against the police brutality, media restrictions on certain coverage including blast scenes,” SJS said. “We also calls for the government to ensure all journalist safety and allow them to have access in order to report freely to the public.”
