Roadside bombing in southern Syria kills a journalist and 3 Syrian soldiers, state-run media say

BEIRUT (AP) — A roadside bombing in southern Syria has killed a Syrian journalist and three soldiers. The state news agency SANA said the bomb exploded on Wednesday when Firas al-Ahmad, a veteran correspondent for the local Sama TV station, was driving back from an assignment at the border with Jordan where Syrian troops were conducting operations against drug dealers. The bomb went off in the neighborhood of Shiyah, in the southern province of Daraa, instantly killing the 31-year-old al-Ahmad and two soldiers. SANA says a third soldier died of his wounds later in hospital. Daraa became known as the cradle of the 2011 uprising against Syrian President Bashar Assad that quickly descended into a full-blown civil war.