(RSF/IFEX) – The following is a 10 May 1999 RSF press release: **Updates IFEX alerts of 10 May, 6 May and 5 May 1999** PRESS RELEASE Pakistan Reporters Sans Frontières calls on the government to halt immediately its campaign to intimidate journalists The Pakistani authorities have for the past week been pursuing an intimidation campaign […]
(RSF/IFEX) – The following is a 10 May 1999 RSF press release:
**Updates IFEX alerts of 10 May, 6 May and 5 May 1999**
PRESS RELEASE
Pakistan
Reporters Sans Frontières calls on the government to halt immediately its
campaign to intimidate journalists
The Pakistani authorities have for the past week been pursuing an
intimidation campaign against the independent press. On 7 May, Najam Sethi,
editor of the Friday Times, was kidnapped by “members of the Punjab police,”
his wife Jugnoo Mohsin stated. She told the daily The News she was held
illegally as about twenty men took her husband away from their house.
According to other sources, Najam Sethi was arrested by the Pakistani
Intelligence Services (ISI) after he made declarations against Pakistan
while visiting India. Najam Sethi had received threats from Pakistani
officials after he gave an interview to a BBC television crew working on a
documentary about corruption scandals in the Pakistani government.
Press investigations into government-level corruption have led the police to
harass and arrest several other journalists. M.A.K. Lodhi, investigations
bureau chief on the daily The News, was kidnapped on 2 May by plainclothes
police. He was released two days later. M.A.K. Lodhi had helped the BBC
crew. They accused him of “destabilising the country.” On 5 May, Ejaz
Haider, an editor with the same weekly, received an anonymous letter
advising him to drape the windows of his car with flak-jackets. The
journalist believes this intimidation is linked to his collaboration with
Najam Sethi. The same day, the car of Imtiaz Alam, a journalist with The
News, was burned in front of his house by two or three men.
Reporters Sans Frontières notes that publications of the Jang press group,
especially the dailies The News and Jang, have been victims of the
intimidation campaign since August 1998, since they published investigative
reports into corruption within the government and the family of Nawaz
Sharif.
Reporters Sans Frontières calls for the immediate and unconditional release
of Najam Sethi, and an end to the intimidation campaign against journalists
probing corruption scandals in the prime minister’s entourage. The
organisation also urges that Pakistani journalists should be allowed to work
with foreign media without fear of reprisals.
