(RSF/IFEX) – RSF has denounced the formal indictment of Pakistani journalist Khawar Mehdi Rizvi by the Quetta Anti-Terrorist Court. On 12 February 2004, Rizvi was charged with fabricating a report for two French magazine journalists about armed Taliban activities along the Afghan border. The organisation deplored the fact that no serious evidence was presented to […]
(RSF/IFEX) – RSF has denounced the formal indictment of Pakistani journalist Khawar Mehdi Rizvi by the Quetta Anti-Terrorist Court. On 12 February 2004, Rizvi was charged with fabricating a report for two French magazine journalists about armed Taliban activities along the Afghan border.
The organisation deplored the fact that no serious evidence was presented to support the charges of “sedition” and “conspiracy” against Rizvi. “Trying a respected journalist before an anti-terrorism court is unworthy of a country that claims to respect press freedom,” RSF said. Two other Pakistani citizens, including a Taliban activist, were also charged by the court. Rizvi did not appear in court.
More than 800 journalists and media workers have signed an international petition drawn up by a committee campaigning for Rizvi’s release (www.freekhawar.org).
On 10 February, Rizvi’s lawyer, Abid Saqi, was allowed to visit the journalist in prison in Quetta and tell him about the international campaign for his release. Rizvi said his arrest and prosecution were aimed at intimidating Pakistani and foreign journalists. The French reporters arrested with Rizvi in Karachi on 16 December 2003 worked for the French weekly magazine “L’Express”. They were released in mid-January.
Rizvi told his brother, who visited him earlier, that he was innocent and that the government had trumped up the charges against him to discredit foreign media. He maintained that the report he prepared with the French journalists was accurate.
The journalist, aged 44, is reported to be weak and suffering from lung problems as a result of poor prison conditions and torture by military intelligence officials. Rizvi has been secretly detained since mid-December. He was previously jailed for several months in the 1980s while campaigning for democracy and against the dictatorship of General Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq.
The initial legal complaint against Rizvi, of which RSF has obtained a copy, accused the French journalists of paying for a fabricated report about armed Taliban groups. The document said Rizvi had engaged in a criminal conspiracy against the Pakistani government and was guilty of “sedition” and “harming the country’s international image”. Rizvi faces life imprisonment. He was originally charged on 25 January and police had since been preparing the case against him.
