Pakistan

Explosives placed outside the building that houses FM 93 Radio Dilbar, a radio station in Charsadda (in the northwestern province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa), were detonated in the early hours of Wednesday, damaging the two rooms, the studio and equipment. The station was able to resume broadcasting later Thursday, after a nine-hour break in service. “We are concerned by this attack’s method and how...

Paris-based press freedom group Reporters sans Frontières (RSF) has lauded the investigation being conducted by the Karachi police into the murder of Geo News TV reporter Wali Khan Babar, who was gunned down on January 14, just minutes after submitting a report about two Karachi gangs. The police announced on April 7 that they arrested four suspects the previous day. “This is the first time in the...

The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) has welcomed movement in the case of the murder of Geo TV reporter Wali Khan Babar in Karachi, and called for a full prosecution to break a longstanding pattern of impunity in journalist murders in Pakistan. Police arrested five men they say carried out the killing in January. Police apprehended the men in a stolen vehicle in the town of Gulshan-e-Iqbal...

The operations of Geo TV network’s profitable sports channel, Geo Super, have been suspended in Pakistan on the orders of the Pakistan Electronic Media Regulatory Authority (PEMRA), which regulates TV stations, cable operators, Internet and mobile phones, and is responsible for developing access to information. Geo News, which is also part of the Geo TV network, has accused the PEMRA of blocking...

Zaman Ali, a reporter who covered organised crime for the Urdu-language newspaper Extra News, was brutally murdered on April 2 in the Karachi suburb of Lyari, one of the most dangerous areas of the city. “The number of journalists killed in Pakistan in the past 13 months now totals 14,” Paris-based press freedom group Reporters sans Frontières (RSF) said. “We are appalled by this permanent state...

Mohammad Rafique Baloch, the vice-president of the Karachi Union of Journalists (KUJ), was abducted Monday in south Karachi and held for several hours. He was on his way to Karachi’s high court to defend pay and working conditions of journalists in Sindh province at a hearing initiated by the KUJ when the incident took place. It is quite clear that the aim of the attackers was to prevent him from...

Thirteen journalists killed in the past 13 months. The world’s deadliest country for media personnel in 2010, with 11 killed, Pakistan continues to be one of the most dangerous in 2011. As well as being very badly paid, its journalists are exposed to every kind of danger. With its tribal northwest, its border with Afghanistan, its tension with India and its chaotic political history, Pakistan is...

Dunya News TV cameraman Fayyaz was shot in the back Monday while covering a meeting of the Punjab provincial assembly in Lahore. It was unclear who fired the shot but fellow journalists said they thought it was a targeted attack linked to his coverage of criticism of an important local party called Nawaz, Paris-based press freedom group Reporters sans Frontières (RSF) has reported. Fayyaz was...

Zahid Hussein, a cameraman working for Express News TV, was injured in the head and arms by police officers in Peshawar while filming a violent crackdown by security forces after a clash between two armed groups on Friday last, Paris-based press freedom group Reporters sans Frontières (RSF) has reported. RSF said it was alarmed by the frequency with which the police are allowed to get out of...

The Committee to Protect Journalists joined the Pakistan Federal Union of Journalists (PFUJ) in calling for an investigation into the drive-by shooting death of Abdost Rind, a 27-year-old part-time journalist in the Turbat area of Balochistan province in Pakistan's southwest on February 18. According to the PFUJ and local media reports, Rind—a reporter with the Daily Eagle, an Urdu-language...