Somalia Offers Reward for Journalist Killer

Muslims pray for the slain body of Somali journalist Mohamed Ibrahim Rageh in Madina district, southern Mogadishu, April 22, 2013.

Somalia's prime minister has called on police and security forces to hunt down the killers of a state broadcaster.

Mohamed Ibrahim Rageh was shot and killed by unknown assailants near his home in the capital, Mogadishu, on Sunday evening.

Rageh, who worked for Somali National Television and Radio Mogadishu, is the fourth journalist killed in Somalia this year, according to the National Union of Somali Journalists.

In a statement, Somali Prime Minister Abdi Shirdon called on police and security forces to "spare no effort" in their hunt to find his killers.

Earlier this year, Somalia's government said it would provide a reward of $50,000 for information leading to the arrest of any person convicted of killing a journalist.

The prime minister acknowledged that journalists in war-torn Somalia work in what he called "an exceptionally challenging environment."

The Committee to Protect Journalists says 12 journalists were killed in the East African country last year.

Rageh had stopped working as a journalist in 2009 and left the country to escape the chronic insecurity. He had recently returned after living in Uganda as an exile.