Iraqi model shot dead amid fears that zealots are targeting high-profile women
AN IRAQI model and fashion blogger has been shot dead in a Baghdad street, the latest in a series of high-profile Iraqi women to be murdered.
Tara Fares, 22, was followed on Instagram, where she posted photos of herself in daring outfits, by more than 2.7million people. She was shot three times at the wheel of her white Porsche convertible on Thursday.
Her killers are unknown but many of her fans on social media said they believed she was targeted by religious fanatics who want to stop Iraqi women freely expressing themselves.
“Tara’s death screams discrimination, lack of freedom and rights,” wrote one fan. “Sympathy is not enough.”
Ahmad al-basheer, an Iraqi satirist, said: “Anyone who finds excuses for those who kill a girl just because she had decided to live like most other girls on the planet is an accomplice to her murder.” Ms Fares seemed to be aware that she was a potential target of extremists. On Instagram in July, she wrote: “It does not frighten me that there are those who reject the existence of God. What really frightens me is there are those who kill and slaughter to prove the existence of God.”
The Iraqi interior ministry said it was investigating the killing.
Ms Fares was killed two days after Suad al-ali, a women’s rights activist, was shot dead in the southern city of Basra as she walked towards her car.
Rafeef al-yaseri and Rasha al-hassan, two Iraqi beauty salon owners, also died in mysterious circumstances in August, leading some Iraqis to believe beauticians are being targeted.