A Maltese investigative journalist who exposed her island nation’s links to offshore tax havens through the leaked Panama Papers has been killed after a bomb exploded in her car.
Daphne Caruana Galizia, 53, had just driven away from her home in Mosta, a town outside Malta’s capital of Valletta, when the bomb went off, sending the vehicle’s wreckage spiralling over a wall and into a field.
Malta’s Prime Minister Joseph Muscat said her death resulted from a “barbaric attack” that also amounted to an assault on freedom of expression.
He described her as “one of [his] harshest critics, on a political and personal level,” as he denounced her slaying.
As part of the investigation, Caruana Galizia revealed Mr Muscat’s wife Michelle, as well as members of his Government, held companies in Panama.
Mr Muscat and his wife deny they held such companies.
Politico named Caruana Galizia as one of 28 Europeans who are “shaping, shaking and stirring” Europe
Opposition leader Adrian Delia called the killing a “political murder” while observers on social media expressed outraged over the brutal killing.
source: abc.net.au