Authorities in the breakaway state of Somaliland are detaining television reporter Abdirahman Keyse Mohamed, also known as Tungub, after he was injured by a shot from the police.
The Committee to Protect Journalists on Friday demanded that the journalist be released.
On May 13, in the town of Las Anod, in Somaliland’s Sool region, police arrested Abdirahman, a reporter with the privately owned broadcaster Bulsho TV, over interviews he conducted with members of the public about the recent arrest of a member of parliament, according to a staffer at the Somaliland-based nongovernmental organization Human Rights Centre and Yahye Mohamed, the executive director of the Somaliland Journalists Association, a local trade organization, both of whom spoke to CPJ.
CPJ said during his arrest, Abdirahman was injured when a police officer fired his gun at the ground and debris hit the journalist in the leg, according to Yahye and the Human Rights Centre representative, who asked not to be named so as to speak for the organization as a whole.
The journalist is in prison pending an investigation into police allegations that he was making anti-national propaganda, spreading false news, and that he disobeyed a police order not to record interviews, according to the Human Rights Centre, which said no formal charges have been filed against him.
“Police injured a journalist in the course of arresting him and now hold him without charge, and his alleged crime is giving voice to diverse political opinions,” said CPJ’s Sub-Saharan Africa representative, Muthoki Mumo.
“We call on authorities to immediately release Abdirahman Keyse Mohamed, investigate how he was injured, and make sure those responsible are held accountable.”
Police took the journalist to a local hospital following his arrest, where his leg was treated before he was transferred back to detention at the police station in Las Anod, according to Yahye and Hargeisa-based journalist Abdikarim Saed Salah, who spoke with CPJ.
PR/as/APA