AFP: Bulgaria Under Pressure after Journalist's Brutal Murder

Bulgaria was under pressure Monday to find the killer of a television journalist whose brutal murder sparked international condemnation, as mourners thronged candlelight vigils in the capital Sofia and the northern town of Ruse where she was killed.

The body of 30-year-old Viktoria Marinova -- who presented a current affairs talk programme called "Detector" for the small private TVN television in Ruse -- was found on Saturday.

Several hundred people, many in tears, attended a vigil in Ruse's central square, lighting candles and laying flowers in front of a portrait of Marinova. A similar observance was held in Sofia.

In Ruse, many told AFP they had known Marinova personally as she had been active with charities in the town on the Danube.

Chief prosecutor Sotir Tsatsarov said Monday that investigators were considering "all leads" including possible links to Marinova's professional activity.

Authorities in Bulgaria, the EU's poorest member state plagued by rampant corruption, earlier revealed that Marinova had been killed by blows to the head and from suffocation, and had also been raped.

"We are in shock. In no way, under any form, never have we received any threats -- aimed at her or the television," a journalist from Marinova's own TVN told AFP on condition of anonymity Sunday, adding that he and his colleagues feared for their safety.

UNESCO chief Audrey Azoulay condemned the murder, saying: "The use of sexual and physical abuse to silence a woman journalist is an outrage against the dignity and basic human rights of every woman."

In a statement from the UN cultural agency's headquarters in Paris, Azoulay added: "Attacks on journalists erode the fundamental human right to freedom of expression and its corollaries,...