Iraqi freelance journalist killed

MOSUL: Gunmen killed an Iraqi journalist outside his home in the northern city of Mosul, a local police officer said on Saturday.

Khudhir Yunis, a freelance journalist working for a number of Baghdad-based newspapers, was shot dead in Mosul's southern Sumar neighbourhood, police Major Mohammed Ahmed said.

Iraq was in 2006 described as the most dangerous place in the world for journalists, where more than 130 journalists and media workers have been killed since the US-led invasion in March 2003.

Yunis, a member of the Iraqi Journalist Association in Mosul, was the fifth journalist to be killed in the country's third largest city in two months.

The bloodiest attack on Iraq's media in recent months came when gunmen burst into the Baghdad offices of new television network Al-Shaabiya on October 12 and killed at least nine staffers, including reporters and the general manager.