Missing Tunisian journalists 'murdered by IS' in Libya

Two Tunisians journalists who went missing in Libya in 2014 were murdered by the Islamic State group a captured militant has said.

He claimed that Sofiene Chourabi and photographer Nadhir Ktari were killed by IS in a forest near Derna, and echoes claims by the group in January 2015 that the pair were murdered.

The Tunisian government said it had evidence the pair were still alive, but nothing has been heard since.

The prisoner, identified as Libyan Abderrazek Nassef Abderrazek Ali, told the al-Hadath al-Libya channel that he had witnessed the pair being executed in a forest outside the eastern town of Derna, which was then under IS control.

He said the two journalists had been captured at an IS roadblock between the towns of Ajdabiya and Labraq and then taken to Derna.

He said an IS court had ordered them killed on the basis of testimony from Tunisian jihadis.

Some 3,000 Tunisians have joined the ranks of jihadi groups fighting in Libya - as well as in Syria and Iraq - according to Tunisian officials. The UN puts the figure at 5,000.

Al-Hadath al-Libya is close to eastern Libya's military strongman Marshal Khalifa Haftar.

The channel said that the suspect - who was shown shaven-headed and wearing an orange jumpsuit - was being held by Haftar's forces.

Relatives of the two journalists conducted a long campaign for information from the Tunisian government on the fate of their loved ones