A female journalist was shot dead Sunday in the Somali capital Mogadishu, adding to the lengthening death toll among media in the violence-torn East African country, her colleagues said.

Sagal Salad Osman, a presenter and producer for state radio station Muqdisho, was gunned down by unidentified men who then fled, they said.

"One of my colleagues, Sagal Salad Osman, was shot dead near a university at Hodon district. She died instantly and the perpetrators have escaped after the shooting," said Ali Abdulkadir, who works at the station.

"We are very much devastated about the news of her death and we don’t know why she was killed."

Several other colleagues confirmed the death.

"It was shocking, I was told she has been studying at the university nearby where she was killed. This is horrible indeed," said Mohamed Salad, another journalist.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility.

Somalia is one of the most dangerous countries in the world for media workers.

According to the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), 45 Somali journalists have been murdered since 2007, a tally that does not include the latest fatality.

Reporters without Borders (RSF) placed the country 172nd out of 180 countries for freedom of the press in 2015.

Journalists have frequently been targeted by the Shabaab, Somalia's violent Islamist group, but some attacks have been attributed to businessmen or politicians angered by coverage.