Three armed and masked gunmen shot Ali Ahmed while he was returning home tonight, near Hotel Guure in Israac village, according to eyewitnesses. “He was walking home and three men armed with pistols approached and shot Ali Ahmed while he was near Hotel Guure in Israac. They shot more than three times and they fled the area immediately. The police arrived in the area and made some investigations, and Mr Ali died there,” Abdurahman Ali, an eyewitness in Galkayo told Somalia Report.
Puntland officials confirmed the incident to Somalia Report, “it was 10:20 pm (2020 GMT) on Sunday evening. The journalist, Ali Ahmed Abdi, was walking near Hotel Guure on his way home. Unknown gunmen shot and killed the journalist and they left the area within minutes. When we heard this, we sent police to the area. We are investigating,” Jama Mohamed Ahmed, a Puntland police officer in the Mudug region told Somalia Report by phone. Police say no-one has been detained for the murder as yet. “It was late when the police arrived in the area. They made some brief investigation and looked for the murderers but we found nothing. No-one was detained as yet,” Jama Ahmed added.
Ali Ahmed Abdi was one of the most active journalists working in the Mudug region, but recently he was preparing to go to Uganda to continue his education.
Ali Ahmed worked for the FM station Radio Galkayo, and over the past year, he was also working with the Somali-language website Puntlandi.com. The website published a story about his assassination, and said that Ali resigned from his job only a few months ago, to go to Uganda to continue his education.
Somali journalists are regularly in danger, and threatened with prison, beatings and killings. Puntland officials promised to do more to detain the murderers of Ali Ahmed Abdi. “We will increase our security operations and wish to detain the murderers. We know these people are those who want peace. We will begin operations tomorrow, and are trying to find out more,” Puntland officer Jama Mohamed Ahmed told Somalia Report.
Mr Ali Ahmed Abdi is the fourth journalist killed in Somalia since last December. On February 28th, unidentified gunmen killed Abukar Hassan Kadaf near his home in Mogadishu. Abukar was the former director of SomaliWeyn media.