Daphne
Caruana Galizia, a prominent Maltese journalist and blogger who made repeated
and detailed corruption allegations against Prime Minister Joseph Muscat
’s
inner circle, was killed by a car bomb on Monday.
Muscat
condemned the killing as a “barbaric” act and ordered security services to
devote maximum resources to bringing those responsible to justice.
“What
happened today is unacceptable on various levels. Today is a black day for our
democracy and our freedom of speech,” he told reporters.
Caruana
Galizia, 53, died mid-afternoon, close to her home in Bidnija in the north of
the island.
The force of
the blast reduced her car to pieces and catapulted the journalist’s body into a
nearby field, witnesses said. She leaves a husband and three sons.
Thousands of
people, holding candles and waving placards, poured into the streets in the
island’s northeast resort town Sliema for a candlelight vigil to pay tribute to
the reporter.
People left
candles, flowers and messages of support at makeshift shrines in the street.
“When the
people fear their government there is tyranny, when the government fears the
people there is LIBERTY,” read one sign left on the pavement with flowers and
candles.
A local
television station reported that Caruana Galizia had filed a police complaint
earlier this month about threats she had received.
“I will not
rest until justice is done,” said Prime Minister Muscat.
“Everyone
knows Ms Caruana Galizia was a harsh critic of mine, both politically and
personally, but nobody can justify this barbaric act in any way,” he added.
In the final
entry on her blog, posted within an hour of her death, Caruana Galizia
reiterated an allegation that Muscat’s chief of staff, Keith Schembri, was a
“crook” who used his government influence to enrich himself.
“There are
crooks everywhere you look now. The situation is desperate,” she signed off.
Caruana
Galizia’s death comes four months after Muscat’s Labour Party won a resounding
victory in a general election he called early as a result of scandals to which
Caruana Galizia’s allegations were central.
Panama
connections
Muscat,
premier since 2013, went to the polls a year early after his wife, Michelle
Muscat, was accused of being the beneficial owner of a secret Panama bank
account.
Caruana
Galizia had alleged the account was used to stash kickbacks from Azerbaijan’s
ruling family linked to an Azeri bank gaining a licence to operate in Malta.
Muscat
called the claims the “biggest lie in Maltese political history,” asked a
magistrate to investigate and has vowed to quit if any link is established
between him and hidden offshore accounts.
The premier
has not applied that principle to two of his closest allies.
Chief of
staff Schembri and government minister Konrad Mizzi were both revealed last
year to be owners of undeclared shell companies established through Panama law
firm Mossack Fonseca.
Muscat has
stood by both of them.
Muscat, 43,
is a former journalist who won plaudits for his polished performances at the
helm of Malta’s presidency of the European Union in the first half of this year.
He won power
in 2013, ending the 15-year rule of the conservative Nationalist Party on a
pro-growth and socially liberal agenda.
In his first
term, he enacted legislation introducing gay civil unions and presided over a
construction and tourism-based economic boom that analysts say won him the June
election.
Some of the
corruption allegations that have swirled around his administration are related
to a scheme under which wealthy individuals can acquire Maltese passports in
return for investing in the island.
There are
also suspicions in other European Union countries that the island’s financial
services sector is facilitating tax avoidance. German tax authorities is
currently investigating some 2,000 Malta-registered companies with links to
German corporations.
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