A senior journalist, Khalil Jibran, has been assassinated by unidentified gunmen near his home in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa's Landi Kotal town, police said on Wednesday.
Jibran, who worked for a private news station named Khyber News, was targeted by unidentified miscreants on a motorbike as he drove home with his friend Sajjad Advocate, District Police Officer (DPO) Khyber Salim Abbas said.
He said that the journalist's vehicle suffered a defect near his home when the gunmen approached him, took him out, and opened fire on him.
Jibran, a former president of the Landi Kotal Press Club, was killed on the spot, while Sajjad was injured, and the perpetrators left the scene. According to the police official, his body was sent to Landi Kotal Hospital for a post-mortem.
The incident occurred in the Mazreena region, near the Landi Kotal Police Station, he said.
The DPO said Jibran had also been threatened by terrorists.
A first information report (FIR) was filed at the Landi Kotal police station against the unknown suspects.
The DPO stated that terrorism charges had been added to the case.
Meanwhile, the murdered journalist was buried in his home village of Sultan Khel, where numerous people attended the funeral prayer.
Prior to the funeral prayer, journalists, politicians, and social figures staged a protest along the Khyber-Pak-Afghan highway, where Gibran's body was also kept.
The demonstrators demanded that the journalist's murderer be apprehended promptly.
KP Chief Minister Ali Amin Gandapur took notice of the incident and directed that the perpetrators of the journalist's murder be apprehended immediately.
KP Governor Faisal Karim Kundi also strongly denounced Jibran's killing.