Islamic State militants slit the throats of five journalists working for a Libyan TV station in the eastern part of the country, an army commander said on Monday.
The reporters had been missing since August, when they left the eastern city of Tobruk after covering the inauguration of the country’s elected parliament to travel to Benghazi. Their route took them through Derna, a militant hotspot, France24 reported.
The reporters – four Libyans and one Egyptian – had been working for Barqa TV, an eastern television supporting federalism for eastern Libya, other journalists said.
Faraj al-Barassi, a district army commander in eastern Libya, said militants loyal to Islamic State were responsible for killing the journalists, whose bodies were found outside the eastern city of Bayda.
“Five bodies with slit throats were found today in the Green Mountain forests,” Barrasi said, referring to a sparsely populated area east of Benghazi. He did not say when the five journalists were believed to have been killed.
Brussels-based International Federation of Journalists (IFJ), a group promoting press freedom, said the reporters had been kidnapped at an Islamic State checkpoint and were killed recently.
“We are deeply shocked by this brutal slaughter,” said IFJ president Jim Boumelha. “IS aims to horrify but we can only feel great sorrow and further resolve to see the killers held responsible for their crimes.”
IS has exploited a security vacuum in Libya, where two governments and parliaments allied to host of armed groups are fighting each other on several fronts four years after the ousting of Muammar Gaddafi.
