Militants attack Iraqi TV channel HQ, kill five journalists

Militants have killed five journalists and injured another five as they attacked an Iraqi TV channel headquarters in Tikrit, detonating bombs and storming the building, police say.

Four militants stormed the Salaheddin TV station in north of Baghdad on Monday, after a car bomb went off at the gate of the building, police officials said.

They added that two of the bombers blew up their explosives as they stormed the Salaheddin T-V station in Tikrit. Security forces managed to kill another two attackers.

The number of casualties was not immediately clear.

“I managed to escape, and I am outside the building, and the third and the fourth floors are on fire now,” said a Salaheddin journalist, adding, “Some of my colleagues are trapped in the building, among them two women. I am calling them on their mobile phones and they are not answering,” he added.

A mortar attack on a military camp also claimed the lives of four officers and two soldiers on Monday.

Iraq’s Interior Ministry has said that militants have launched an open war in Iraq and they want to push the Middle Eastern country into chaos.

“The country is currently facing an open war from bloodthirsty sectarian forces that aim to plunge the country into chaos,” the Interior Ministry said in a statement issued on July 30.

On December 1, Iraq’s ministries of health and defense said 948 people, including 852 civilians, 53 police officers and 43 soldiers, had been killed in violent attacks across the country in November.

The figures make November one of the deadliest months in 2013, with civilians accounting for about 90 percent of the fatalities.

The United Nations also says at least 8,000 people have lost their lives in Iraq so far this year.