An Afghan journalist working for the BBC was found shot dead today, a day after gunmen abducted him in the southern province of Helmand.
Abdul Samad Rohani went missing in Lashkar Gar, Helmand yesterday. His body was found this afternoon. He had been shot in the head, the BBC said.
The broadcaster called Mr Rohani’s death ‘a terrible loss’.
There was no claim of responsibility for the killing and officials have been unable to identify his attackers.
Helmand has seen some of the worst violence in an escalating insurgency by the extremist Taliban.
Several journalists have been attacked in Afghanistan this year, but the BBC reporter's death appeared to be the first in 2008.
Five Afghan journalists were killed in Afghanistan in 2007, according to the Kabul-based South Asia Media Commission.
15 other people were also killed in violence in Afghanistan today. In one incident, Taliban rebels ambushed a police convoy on a main road in the central province of Ghazni and killed six policemen. Two civilians were killed in the crossfire.
In another attack blamed on the Taliban, a district deputy governor and three of his bodyguards were killed in an ambush in the eastern province of Khost.
Elsewhere, Taliban fighters ambushed a police patrol in the southern province of Uruzgan early today, killing one policeman, while two Taliban died in Helmand when a mine they were planting in a road exploded.
Laura Bush visits Afghanistan
Meanwhile, US First Lady Laura Bush made a surprise visit to Afghanistan today to show support for the troubled nation.
Mrs Bush said she wants to see progress in Afghanistan ahead of a Paris conference on 12 June, where Kabul will present a $50.1bn, five-year development plan for the country.
She also announced, after talks with President Hamid Karzai, that Washington would spend $80m over five years to support the American University in Kabul and the government's National Literacy Centre.
