Gunmen have shot dead an Iraqi journalist in a Kurdish neighbourhood of the northern oil city of Kirkuk, the city police chief Brigadier General Sarhad Qader told AFP on Tuesday.
Soran Mamah Hammah, a Kurd, was gunned down Monday evening by armed men in the Kurdish Rasheedwa neighbourhood, Qader said.
"Unknown armed men opened fire on the Kurdish journalist Soran Mamah Hammah as he was stepping out of his home Monday," Qader said.
Paris-based media watchdog Reporters Without Borders said he was killed by four men who later escaped in a BMW car.
Hammah was working for Lafeen, a political magazine published in the Kurdish language from the northern city of Sulaimaniyah.
Condemning the murder of Hammah, Reporters Without Borders said he had received threats in the past and urged a thorough investigation into the murder.
"He wrote hard-hitting articles about local politicians and security officials and had received threats from people telling him to stop his investigative reporting," Reporters Without Border said.
Hammah, 23, had worked for Lafeen for three years.
His murder brings the number of journalists and media employees killed in Iraq since the March 2003 invasion to 217, Reporters Without Borders said, adding 13 of them have been slain in Kirkuk.
According to Iraq's Journalism Freedom Observatory, at least 237 media workers, including 22 foreigners, have been killed since the invasion.
Most of the Iraqi journalists killed have been targetted by insurgent groups or militias angered by their coverage or ideologically opposed to their employers. Others have died in crossfire.
