Santo Domingo, Aug 3 (IANS/EFE): A Dominican journalist who reported on alleged ties between a prosecutor and drug traffickers was kidnapped and killed in the eastern city of La Romana, police said.

Unknown assailants shot Jose Silvestre twice in the stomach, a police source told EFE.

Media accounts said the reporter was accosted by four individuals who, after a struggle, forced Silvestre into a gold-colored Ford Explorer and drove off.

Several people are being held for questioning in connection with the crime, the source said, adding that National Police commander Jose Armando Polanco Gomez took charge of the investigation.

Silvestre, who hosted a news programme on the regional network Cana TV, said on the air that La Romana prosecutor Jose Polanco Ramirez had links to drug trafficking.

Polanco Ramirez accused the reporter of slander - a criminal offense here - and Silvestre was jailed in early June for about a week before a judge ordered him released pending trial on bail of 100,000 pesos ($2,650).