A GRADUATE from Bournemouth University was murdered on her first day in her dream job at the United Nations in Baghdad.

Reham Al-Farra, who graduated from the campus this year, was one of the 23 workers killed when a bomb ripped through the UN's compound in the Iraqi capital.

Tributes have been flooding in from shocked student friends and lecturers of the 29-year-old Jordanian, describing her as a brilliant young journalist.

Reham spent a year at Bournemouth completing a post-graduate masters in multi media journalism, thanks to a scholarship scheme with the British Council.

After graduating she went to work for the UN in New York as head of the Arabic news unit.

So impressed were UN bosses with her work that she was seconded to their Baghdad office for a month to become the deputy media spokesperson.

She arrived in the country a day before the bombing.

Fellow student, Jemma Fannon, said: "I am absolutely devastated. Reham used to say that she had already seen terrible things from her past life in Jordan.

"We used to have debates on the course about journalism and dangers post September 11 so her death in this way is so much harder to bear."

Dan Howard, deputy head of the Bournemouth Media School on campus said: "News of Reham's tragic death comes as a shock to the university and particularly the Bournemouth Media School where she was a bright and popular student held in high regard by her fellow students and staff.

"Reham was building on her career in journalism and working for the UN had always been her ambition. To see that brilliance extinguished is something we're all finding very difficult to come to terms with."