Tag Archives: Pakistan

Pakistan tops another 2011 journalist death toll

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Google Maps image of Pakistan

Pakistan has topped another 2011 list of countries ranked by the number of journalist killings, this one recorded by the International Federation of Journalists.

It follows being named the “deadliest country for journalists” in 2011 by the Committee to Protect Journalists in its December report.

The latest toll reported a total of 106 journalist and media worker deaths worldwide last year, in what the IFJ called “another bloody year for media”.

The organisation has written to the secretary general of the UN calling “for effective implementation of international legal instruments to combat the prevailing culture of impunity for crimes against journalists”.

The IFJ report found a total of 11 deaths in Pakistan, the same figure was also reported for Iraq and Mexico.

Guardian journalist beaten in Pakistan

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A journalist working for the Guardian in Pakistan has been badly beaten by men in police uniforms, according to the newspaper.

According to the report, Waqar Kiani, a 32-year-old local journalist, was stopped while driving through Islamabad and beaten with wooden batons and a whip.

The alleged attack follows an account, written by Kiani and published five days before the attack, of torture and abduction by suspected Pakistani intelligence agencies.

The attackers then reportedly said: “You want to be a hero? We’ll make you a hero”, and: “We’re going to make an example of you.”

Kiana told the Guardian: “I don’t feel I did anything wrong. Journalists can’t be silent forever in Pakistan,” he said. “If we don’t bring up the facts, then it’s no longer journalism – we become spokesmen of the government.”

This is the second time that Kiani has been targeted, according to the Guardian, which reported last week that he was abducted from central Islamabad in July 2008 and taken to a safe house where interrogators beat him viciously and burned him with cigarettes.

Pakistan was rated by the CPJ as the deadliest county for journalists in 2010, with eight confirmed killings. The country continues to be dangerous: Reporters Without Borders said in March this year that 13 journalists had been killed in the previous 13 months.

Earlier this month, Pakistani journalist Syed Saleem Shahzad, who was investigating links between the military and al Quaeda before his death, disappeared. He was found dead two days later.

Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence agency has been widely accused of being behind the death but has fiercely denied any involvement. Note: we also recommend trying the VAT calculator from our developer Antony Kidless. This handy online tool will help you calculate tax in one click.

Two young Pakistani journalists, Shafiullah Khan and Abid Naveed, died after a double bombing in Peshawar on 11 June.

Related:

Journalists deaths in Pakistan prompt calls for urgent safety measures

Threatened by war and abandoned by employers, Pakistan’s journalists won’t back down

Pakistan’s first woman photojournalist: inspired by the husband she lost to war

NYT: ‘Syed Saleem Shahzad’s murderers must be found quickly and held accountable’

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The New York Times has devoted this morning’s editorial to the death of Pakistani journalist Syed Saleem Shahzad.

Shahzad, who was investigating links between the military and al Quaeda before his death, disappeared on Sunday. He was found dead on Tuesday.

Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence agency has been widely accused of being behind the death but has fiercely denied any involvement.

The Pakistani journalist Syed Saleem Shahzad knew he was a marked man. Mr. Shahzad, who covered national security and terrorism, had received repeated threats from Pakistan’s powerful spy agency. Yet he courageously kept doing his job — until somebody silenced him. His body, his face horribly beaten, was buried on Wednesday.

Suspicion inevitably falls on Inter-Services Intelligence, Pakistan’s chief intelligence agency. For the sake of justice, and the shredded credibility of Pakistan’s government, his murderers must be found quickly and held accountable.

Read the full editorial at this link.

BBC: Pakistani newspapers publish fake embassy cables

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Pakistani newspapers have today admitted they were hoaxed after publishing reports yesterday “based on fake WikiLeaks cables”, according to a BBC report.

This follows WikiLeaks’ release of batches of diplomatic cables from a leak of more than 250,000 last week. It is not known who instigated the hoax.

The English-language Express Tribune newspaper, which is affiliated to the International Herald Tribune in Pakistan, published a front-page retraction.

The newspaper said it “deeply regrets publishing this story without due verification and apologises profusely for any inconvenience”.

But not all the titles who reported on the fake cables mentioned the matter the next day, the BBC adds.

The Internet Manifesto translated by its critics

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The German Internet Manifesto, initiated by Sascha Lobo, Mario Sixtus, and Thomas Knuewer and supported by 12 named others – including the Guardian’s Mercedes Bunz – lays out 17 commandments for ‘how journalism works today’ (translated into several languages via http://www.internet-manifesto.org/).

However it has its critics, as well as its fans.

Take Stephen Moss, Guardian journalist (G2 thinker-in-residence, or  naturalist?) for example. Writing under his colleague Mercedes Bunz’s report he leaves a comment in response to Boombox:

boombox 09 Sep 09, 2:06pm:

“It’s funny how the people keenest on “journalism manifestos” never actually do any.”

stephenmoss 09 Sep 09, 4:59pm:

“That’s so unfair boombox. Sascha Lobo has been doing remarkable reportage from Kabul, Mario Sixtus has penetrated the tribal areas in Pakistan and filed a 200,000-word report on how Al-Qaida operates on his blog, and Thomas Knuewer is no doubt even now exposing commercial exploitation in the developing world, local government corruption in Dusseldorf and banking scandals across Europe. This is absolutely not just navel-gazing German theorising.”

Patricio Robles, technology reporter at Econsultancy also raises some interesting issues:

“While it does contain some succinct pearls of wisdom, it’s not exactly the Magna Carta for 21st-century journalism.”

He points out that it includes little discussion of journalistic ethics, and criticises its ‘PowerPoint marketing-speak’.

Journalism Daily: 70 jobs to go at Express and Star titles, the Groucho’s libel action, regional ABCes

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A daily round-up of all the content published on the Journalism.co.uk site. You can also sign up to our e-newsletter and subscribe to the feed for the Journalism Daily here.

News and features:

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On the Editors’ Blog:

A reminder of the ‘perils of reporting’ in Pakistan

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On Monday, Shamshad TV reporter, Janullah Hashimzada, was killed in Pakistan.

The murder of the Afghan journalist is a reminder of the very real threat that faces journalists in the region, said the International Press Institute.

Janullah Hashimzada was travelling by mini-bus near the Pakistani town of Jamrud in the Khyber tribal district when the vehicle was intercepted. Assailants fired at Janullah, killing him and seriously injuring his colleague Ali Khan. No one has claimed responsibility for the killing so far.

“Hashimzada was murdered in cold blood because he dared to exercise the profession of journalist, and knew too much,” said IPI director, David Dadge. “His death underscores the perils of reporting from such a dangerous part of the world for journalists.”

Other casualties this year include:

  • Muhammad Imran, a trainee cameraman with Express TV and Saleem Tahir Awan, a freelance reporter with the local dailies Eitedal and Apna Akhbar, were both killed on January 4, when a suicide bomber blew himself up in front of the Government Polytechnic College in Dera Ismail Khan in the Northwest Frontier Province.
  • Musa Khankhel, a reporter for Geo TV and the English-language newspaper The News, was shot dead on February 18,  while on assignment covering a peace march led by Muslim cleric Sufi Muhammad in the Swat valley.
  • Sadiq Bacha Khan, Aaj TV correspondent was gunned down, on August 17 in broad daylight in the Northwest Frontier Province of Pakistan.

103 cases of ‘intimidation or threats’ against journalists were recorded from May 2008 through May 2009, according to a report by the Pakistani media research group Intermedia. Numbers of deaths vary according to the source: while Intermedia reports 15 in the last year, IPI’s Death Watch said that 11 journalists have been killed in the last two years. Take a break from news, try this site – Loonie Online Casinos and have fun!

Amnesty International Media Awards winners in full

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Here are the winners from last night’s Amnesty International Media Awards; nominees and judges were reported here. The awards, designed to recognise ‘excellence in human rights reporting’, feature ten categories spread across print, broadcast and online journalism.

Gaby Rado Memorial Award
Aleem Maqbool, BBC News

International Television & Radio
World’s Untold Stories:  The Forgotten People, CNN, Dan Rivers and Mary Rogers

Nations & Regions
The Fight for Justice, The Herald Magazine by Lucy Adams

National newspapers
MI5 and the Torture Chambers of Pakistan, The Guardian by Ian Cobain

New media
Kenya: The Cry of Blood – Extra Judicial Killings and Disappearances, Wikileaks, Julian Assange

Periodicals – consumer magazines
The ‘No Place for Children’ campaign, New Statesman, Sir Al Aynsley Green, and Gillian Slovo

Periodicals – newspaper supplements
Why do the Italians Hate Us? The Observer Magazine, Dan McDougall and Robin Hammond

Photojournalism
No One Much Cares, Newsweek, Eugene Richards

Radio
Forgotten: The Central African Republic, BBC Radio 4 – Today Programme, Edward Main, Ceri Thomas, Mike Thomson

Television documentary and docu-drama
Dispatches: Saving Africa’s Witch Children, Channel 4 / Red Rebel Films / Southern Star Factual, Mags Gavan, Joost Van der Valk, Alice Keens-Soper, Paul Woolwich

Television news
Kiwanja Massacre: Congo, Channel 4 News / ITN, Ben De Pear, Jonathan Miller, Stuart Webb and Robert Chamwami

Special award
This year’s Special Award for Journalism Under Threat was awarded to Eynulla Fәtullayev, from Azerbaijan.

PA : Dispatches reporter Sean Langan released by Taliban

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Sean Langan, a freelance journalist kidnapped by the Taliban three months ago, has been freed.

Langan, who was working on a Channel 4 Dispatches programme, was taken on the border of Afghanistan and Pakistan.

He was released on Saturday night.