By Staff Reporter
ISLAMABAD: Senior journalist Arshad Sharif shot dead last month was the victim of a targeted killing in Kenya, not an accidental shooting, the interior minister said on Tuesday.
Though, Rana Sanaullah, the interior minister, said he still needed more information on the incident.
Outspoken journalist Sharif was shot and killed in October by Nairobi police while living in hiding in Kenya. Nairobi police said it was a case of “mistaken identity” during a search for a similar car involved in a child abduction case.
“Arshad Sharif’s death is not a case of mistaken identity – I can say, and, on the evidence we have so far, this prima facie is a targeted killing,” Sanaullah told a news conference in Islamabad.
“We still need to obtain more [evidence] to confirm all this… and we have asked the Kenyan government for more data.”
The government had formed an investigation team to look into the killing, which has caused uproar in the country.
Sanaullah said the team had returned from Kenya, but Kenyan police had not yet given Pakistani investigators all of Sharif’s recovered belongings.
“We will now ask the foreign office to contact the Kenyan government, and the prime minister will also speak to the Kenyan president.”
International newswires reported that the Kenyan police spokesperson Bruno Shioso declined to respond to Sanaullah’s comments.
Shioso said the case was being investigated by the police watchdog, the Independent Policing Oversight Authority (IPOA). A spokesperson at the IPOA did not immediately respond to calls and a message seeking comment, they added.
Sharif’s remains were brought back to Pakistan last month and buried on October 27 with thousands of people in attendance, chanting slogans and demanding the arrest of his killers.
Sharif was considered close to the country’s military establishment. However, after the removal of former Prime Minister Imran Khan’s government in April through a parliamentary vote of no confidence, Sharif became critical of the military.
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