While journalists in the European Union (EU) generally work in good conditions, there are cases of murdered journalists, and many of them remain unpunished.[1] This list includes non-EU countries within Europe such as Turkey, Ukraine and Russia.
Number of journalists killed or murdered in Europe (not all countries included in the list are included in the map) while on duty or assignment, 1992–2017
Abkhazia
Alexandra Tuttle, correspondent for The Wall Street Journal, was killed on 22 September 1993 when the military plane on which she was flying was hit by an Abkhazian ground-to-air missile.[2]
Georgy Chanya, correspondent for Resonants was killed on 26 May 1998 while reporting fighting between Abkhazian rebels and Georgian guerrilla fighters near Gali.[4]
Camera operator Adil Bunyatov for Reuters TV and the Turan News Agency was killed on 17 March 1995, while covering a military offense on a rebel police unit.[8]
Elmar Huseynov, founder and editor of the opposition weekly news magazine Monitor, was gunned down in his apartment building in Baku on 2 March 2005.[9][10]
Newspaper editor Novruzali Mamedov, of the now-defunct Talysh minority newspaper Talyshi Sado, died in a prison hospital on 17 August 2009. His death was condemned by Baku-based Institute for Reporters' Freedom and Safety as government neglect.[11]
Freelance reporter Rafiq Tağı, who contributed to the Azerbaijani branch of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL), was stabbed on 19 November 2011 and died in a Baku hospital on 23 November.[12]
Rasim Aliyev, chairman of the Institute for Reporters' Freedom and Safety, was beaten up on 8 August 2015 by football fans for his opinion against one of the players. He died from his wounds the following day.[13]
Belarus
Dzmitry Zavadski disappeared and was presumably murdered on 7 July 2000. On 14 March 2002 four people were sentenced for his abduction, but not for the murder, as the body had never been found,[14] and while the performers may have been condemned, the masterminds are still at large.[15] He was declared dead on 28 November 2003.[16]
On 29 May 1993 a humanitarian convoy was assailed near Gornji Vakuf. Italian journalist Guido Puletti was killed among fellow pacifists Sergio Lana and Fabio Moreni, while two others escaped. Hanefija Prijić (Paraga), the leader of the group of Bosnian soldiers responsible for the killings, was condemned to 13 years in prison.[19]
Dominique Lonneux, Belgian freelance cameraman working for a Mexican TV, was wounded and died on 2 June 1993 in western Herzegovina when the UNPROFOR convoy he was travelling with was attacked.[20]
Tasar Omer, Turkish freelance journalist, was killed on 27 June 1993 by a sniper in Sarajevo at a funeral.[21]
Sasa Kolevski, cameraman for the Bosnian Serb Television in Banja Luka, disappeared on 23 September 1995 in Mount Ozren, together with the station driver Goran Pejcinovic, whose body was returned to Bosnian Serb authorities on 25 October.[24]
Bulgaria
Radio presenter and author Bobi Tsankov was shot dead in central Sofia on 5 January 2010.[25]
Victoria Marinova, a television journalist who reported on an investigation into alleged corruption involving European Union funds, was murdered in Bulgaria's northern town of Ruse. Her body was found on 6 October 2018.[26] A Bulgarian man, Severin Krasimirov was found guilty and sentenced to 30 years in jail. Prosecutors said the crime was "linked to sexual motives and had no links to the profession of the victim."[27]
Croatia
According to the Croatian Journalists' Association (HND) at least 14 Croatian reporters, cameramen and technicians were killed in Croatia during the Yugoslav Wars; according to Balkan Insight 13 foreign reporters were also killed:[28]
Croatian reporter Siniša Glavašević was beaten and executed by Serbian paramilitary forces, along with hundreds of others between 18 and 20 November 1991, during the Battle of Vukovar.[32]
Croatian journalist Ivo Pukanić and his business associate Niko Franjić were killed in an assassination attempt in Zagreb on 23 October 2008. They were killed by a car bomb in front of the Nacional editorial office. The media characterized the assassination as a terrorist act.[37]
Journalist Adem Yavuz[tr] was shot dead after being captured by the Greek Cypriots on 26 August 1974.[38]
Turkish Cypriot journalist Kutlu Adalı was fatally machine-gunned outside his home in Nicosia on 6 July 1996. The Turkish Revenge Brigade claimed responsibility,[39] but no one was convicted. According to his widow, evidence had been wiped away and no investigation was conducted.[40]
Journalist and essayist Nicolas Giudici[fr] was killed in Corsica on 16 June 2001. The investigators excluded that the crime could have been related with politics or mafia, and the National Liberation Front of Corsica denied involvement. A robber was suspected for the crime, but he was killed before the trial.[43]
Alexander Lashkarava, Georgian journalist was found dead on 11 July 2021 after having been beaten in an anti-LGBT attack.[51] The killing of Alexander Lashkarava[52] was condemned by the Director-General of the UNESCO Audrey Azoulay in a press-release published on the 13th of July.[53] According to global monitoring on the safety of journalists by the Observatory of Killed journalist, Lashkarava is the 1st and only media professional killed in Georgia in 2021.[54]
Germany
Jusuf Gërvalla, assassinated in 1982 in West Germany, allegedly by the Yugoslav government.
Alexandra Fröhlich, assassinated in 2025 in Hamburg, Germany by gunshot, later arrested by the German police.
Beppe Alfano[it], killed by the Mafia on 8 January 1993.
Kazakhstan
Askhat Sharipjanov, an editor of the website Navigator, was hit by a car in Almaty on 20 July 2004. The driver was found guilty of traffic violations and careless driving that resulted in a person's death, but Sharipjanov's colleagues believed it was contract murder.[60]
Gennady Pavlyuk (pen name: Ibragim Rustambek), editor-in-chief of Bely Parokhod, died in a hospital Almaty on 22 December 2009, six days after falling from a building with his hands and legs bound with tape. Two people were condemned for his murder.[61]
Radio journalist Djuro Slavuj and driver Ranko Perenic, two Serbs working for Radio Pristina, were on assignment on 21 August 1998, when they were abducted by a group of armed people with insignia of the Kosovo Liberation Army and disappeared.[64]
Afrim Maliqi[Wikidata], a Kosovo journalist working for the newspaper Bujku, was killed on 2 December 1998 in Pristina.[65][66]
On 11 January 1999, Enver Maloku, a Kosovo Albanian journalist, writer and head of the Kosovo Information Centre, was shot in Pristina.[67]
On 10 September 2000 Shefki Popova, an ethnic Albanian journalist working for the Rilindja newspaper was killed at the entrance of his house in Vučitrn.[62] He was also active in local politics and in international cooperation. Motive remains unconfirmed.[68]
Journalist Bekim Kastrati was killed on 19 October 2001 while he was in his car with two other men: one of them was also killed and one was wounded. The motive is unconfirmed.[69]
Xhemail Mustafa, Kosovo journalist and advisor to the president Ibrahim Rugova, was killed by two unknown gunmen on 23 November 2000 in front of his apartment in Pristina.[70]
Bardhyl Ajeti was shot on 3 June 2005 in Kosovo and died from his wounds in an hospital in Milan on 28 June. No one has been condemned.[56]
Latvia
Gundars Matiss died on 28 November 2001, from a brain hemorrhage after being attacked on 15 November.[71]
Jarosław Ziętara a 24-year-old investigative journalist for regional daily newspaper Gazeta Poznańska was kidnapped on 1 September 1992 in Poznań and been killed in connection with his reporting on alleged corruption.[76]
Investigative journalist Marek Pomykała was kidnaped and killed in 29 April 1997 in Sanok. In 2022, Tadeusz P., a former police officer, was arrested for murder. According to information from the prosecutor's office, the motive for the journalist's murder was his investigation into the suspect's connection to two murders in the 1980s.[77]
Investigative journalist Łukasz Masiak was beaten to death in Mlawa on 14 June 2015.[78]
Journalist of Good Morning TVN TV station Paweł Kiljański was killed in 27 March 2022. [79] The search for the suspect is ongoing. An Interpol Red Notice has been issued. [80]
Romania
La Cinq reporter Jean-Louis Calderon died crushed by an army tank on the streets of Bucharest on 22 December 1989, while covering the uprising against the communist government.[81]
VTM reporter Danny Huwé was killed by snipers on 23 December 1989, while entering Bucharest by car.[82]
Dada Vujasinović was found dead in her apartment on 8 April 1994. The police ruled it a suicide, but most evidence disputes this. Since January 2009, her death was regarded as a murder case, but no one has been arrested.[83]
Slavko Ćuruvija was murdered on 11 April 1999 in Belgrade. In November 2013 the Slavko Ćuruvija Foundation was established with the aim to preserve his heritage and advance media freedom in Serbia.[84] A trial is ongoing but according to Veran Matić, president of the Commission for the Investigation of the Murder of Journalists in Serbia, the trial chamber is acting with the intent of acquitting those accused.[85]
Milan Pantić was killed on 11 June 2001 in Jagodina. The case is still unsolved but the commission led by Matić has collected new data.[88]
Broadcast journalist Luka Popov was killed in his home in the village of Srpski Krstur on 16 June 2016.[89] A few days later three people were arrested.[90]
On 25 February 2018, the Slovak investigative reporter Ján Kuciak, 27, and his partner were found shot dead in their home in Veľká Mača, western Slovakia. "As a reporter for online news website Aktuality.sk,[91] Kuciak wrote about serious economic crimes and illegal activities involving several high profile Slovak businessmen and their relations with top politicians", EUobserver reports,[92] adding that "Kuciak was also working on a story linking prime minister Robert Fico's assistant with an Italian businessman in Slovakia. Among numerous tax frauds and public fund scandals, he covered the Panama Papers".[92] The murder led to multiple protests organized under the "For decent Slovakia" movement.
Slovenia
Austrian-German news camera operator Nikolas Vogel was killed in a bomb incident on 28 June 1991 during the Ten-Day War along with his German colleague Norbert Werner.[93]
South Ossetia
Alexander Klimchuk (head of Caucasus Images) and Grigol Chikhladze (a freelance and member of Caucasus Images) were killed on 10 August 2008 when they tried to enter Tskhinvali.[94][95]
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