BAGHDAD
An officer in a brigade responsible for guarding a Baghdad compound controlled by ailing Iraqi President Jalal Talabani killed a journalist after an argument on Saturday, officials said.
It was not immediately clear what sparked the exchange that led to the shooting in the upscale Jadriyah neighborhood, but the Kurdish peshmerga captain fled the scene shortly after Muhammad Bidaiwi, editor-in-chief of Radio Free Iraq, was killed.
“The peshmerga captain killed him after he stopped him (Bidaiwi) from getting into the compound,” said a journalist at Radio Free Iraq who declined to be identified.
“We did not move the corpse yet… The officer responsible has disappeared.”
An interior ministry official confirmed the account, while Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki’s official spokesman called for the officer to be arrested and taken to court.
