ANKARA: Star correspondent of Iran’s Press TV, accused by Ankara of spying – following her recent story blaming Turkey of allowing ISIS militants to cross into Kobane, died in a car accident on Sunday.
Serena Shim, an American citizen with Lebanese origin, was killed in a “suspicious” car accident near the Turkey-Syria border, reported Iran-based Press TV.
According to the report, Shim was killed on Sunday in the city of Suruc in Turkey’s Urfa Province, when her car collided with a heavy vehicle while she was going back to her hotel from a report scene.
The police claim they have not been able to locate the truck or the driver yet.
Shim came to Syria to cover the ongoing war in the strategic Syrian town of Kobane. Shim is specialised in Middle East affairs, with special focus on Lebanon, Iraq and Ukraine.
The accident has created an air of suspicion on Turkey as Shim had told Press TV on Friday that the Turkish intelligence agency has accused her of spying, following her stories which exposed Turkey’s support to the ISIS.
Shim reportedly told her employer that she feared Ankara was watching her moves and would try to arrest her.
Shim said she was among the few journalists obtaining stories of militants infiltrating into Syria through the Turkish border.
In her last on-air interview, Shim had told Turkey that she was “surprised” at the accusation as she has nothing to hide and has never done anything, aside her job.
Shim, a mother of two, has done several stories on ISIS militants infiltrating into Syria, through the Turkish border. In one of her reports, the journalist had shown images of militants crossing the Turkish border into Syria, by hiding in World Food Organization (WFO) and other NGOs’ trucks.
Kobani and its surroundings have been under attack since mid-September, with the ISIL militants capturing dozens of nearby Kurdish villages.
Turkey has been accused of backing ISIL militants in Syria.
TURKISH HAND?
Fars News Agency reported that Shim’s family doubts if it was really a “car accident”.
Shim’s family reportedly stated that they suspect if the Turkish authorities are responsible for the death of the journalist. The report claims her parents now want to pursue the matter legally.
Press TV aired views of a political analyst who termed the suspicious death of Serena Shim, as an act of assassination by the government of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
The reality is that our sister Serena was assassinated by Erdogans regime, Shabir Hassan Ali, a political analyst from London, said in an interview with Press TV on Sunday night, adding, Serena was hounded in a fashion by Turkish intelligence.
The analyst further called the killing of Maya Nasser, another Press TV correspondent, in Syria an act of assassination by terrorist groups.
In 2012, Nasser was shot in the neck and the chest by a foreign-backed sniper in the Syrian capital Damascus.
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