Pakistan Press Foundation

A report on the safety of Pakistani media professionals presents a bleak picture of the level of insecurity faced by Pakistani journalists and calls for serious efforts by governments and the media to change the present situation whereby those that kill, injure, abduct and threaten journalists are almost never punished.

Pakistani journalists are not only targeted by militants but also by political, religious, ethnic and other pressure groups as well as law enforcement agencies. Incidents of threats, attacks and killings of journalists in Pakistan are clear evidence of how critical the situation is due to the thriving culture of impunity.

The paramilitary Frontier Corps in FATA, Pakistan, raided the house of local correspondent Rahat Shinwari, and detained him. He was eventually released after a protest by local journalists and members of the Press Club.

Armed men on a motorcycle fired five to six shots at the Digital Satellite News Gathering (DSNG) van of Samaa television. This is the third attack on the media just in the city of Karachi in September.

Unknown gunmen opened fired on the Geo News broadcast van, killing satellite technical engineer Arshad Ali Jaffery and wounding driver Anis Chauhan. There were two more attacks on journalists within 24 hours for which the motives are not yet clear.

Pakistani authorities have arrested the alleged killers of Baloch journalist Irshad Mastoi and two of his colleagues, who were murdered in August 2014.

IFEX members urge the UN Security Council to ensure the protection of journalists in Yemen in light of historic resolution.

Four years after Sierra Leone Journalist Ibrahim Foday’s death, members of IFEX join the Media Foundation for West Africa in calling for more rapid progress.