Journalist shot dead in Pakistan

**Unidentified gunmen have shot dead an Afghan journalist in north-west Pakistan, officials say.**Janullah Hashimzada, 40, was the bureau chief in Peshawar for Afghanistan’s Shamshad television channel.

He was returning from Afghanistan in a passenger bus when militants ambushed the vehicle near Jamrud, the main town in Khyber tribal district.

The area is a stronghold of the Taliban. Mr Hashimzada was known to be an outspoken critic of the militants.

“The attackers in a Toyota Corolla car intercepted the bus and made it stop and then they went inside and shot him dead,” Reuters news agency quoted Rehan Khattak, a government official in Jamrud, as saying.

One passenger was wounded, he said.

Mr Hashimzada was based in Peshawar, the capital of North West Frontier Province.

He also worked as a freelance, supplying video footage to various organisations around the world.

He was a known critic of the insurgents.

A number of journalists have been killed in north-west Pakistan in recent years. Media freedom groups say the region is one of the world’s most dangerous for journalists to work in.