NEPAL - FEMALE JOURNALIST MURDERED
Kathmandu,
Nepal | January 12, 2009
Via Agence France-Presse
A
FEMALE journalist who wrote about women's rights and criticised political
leaders has been stabbed to death in southern Nepal, officials and colleagues
said today.
The region
where she was murdered, the Terai plains, has seen sporadic violence since 2006
when the Maoists ended their civil war before winning elections last year.
"Uma
Singh was attacked by around 15 armed people who stormed into her rented
apartment Sunday evening and stabbed her,'' said Shambhu Koirala, a local
official from Sarlahi, 90km southeast of Kathmandu.
Dozens of
armed groups claiming to fight for increased regional autonomy have emerged in
southern Nepal in recent years, with scores of people killed.
Singh, 24,
worked for a local daily newspaper and radio station and her editor said
he believed people angered by her coverage could have been responsible for her
death.
"Recently
she wrote articles criticising the dowry system, and she has also written about
the involvement of political leaders in the ongoing Terai unrest,'' said Brij
Kumar Yadav, editor of Janakpur
Today.
"She
was a courageous journalist, and this brutal killing shows that journalists in
Nepal face tremendous threats,'' her editor said.
Excluding
Singh, four journalists have been killed in Nepal since 2007, according to the
New York-based rights group Human Rights Watch.