Pakistan

An attempt has been made on the life of Dunya TV reporter Hafiz Muhammad Imran Shehzad in Sialkot, in the northeastern Pakistan province of Punjab. This followed his coverage of the lynching of two brothers in the presence of police officers in Sialkot, which shocked Pakistani public opinion. Aged 27, Imran has been hospitalised with the injuries he received when he was attacked and badly beaten...

A Pakistani court has ordered the federal and provincial governments to restore the transmission of Geo News and three other channels whose programmes have been blocked after they aired reports about a man hurling shoes at President Asif Ali Zardari. The ruling Pakistan People's Party (PPP) has said it had not ordered cable operators to block these channels and described reports about their...

Journalist too have been among the victims of the floods in Pakistan. One journalist has died and the houses of over 200 others have been damaged, according to the Pakistan Federal Union of Journalists (PFUJ). The union has appealed to the international community, journalists, human rights organisations and overseas Pakistanis to generously support journalists affected by the floods. In an appeal...

The transmissions of Pakistan's two leading private TV news channels were blocked, and copies of two newspapers were burnt in Karachi and some other parts of the country. The incidents were carried out Sunday by activists of the ruling Pakistan People's Party (PPP) in reaction to the airing and printing of news about the hurling of shoes at PPP Co-Chairman and President of Pakistan, Asif Ali...

There has been an escalation of violence against journalists in Pakistan during the past few weeks with three murder attempts (two in Bajaur, in the Tribal Areas, and one in Hyderabad) and a severe beating in Hyderabad. The home of Din New TV reporter Imran Khan in Bajaur was the target of a Taliban grenade attack on July 7 that injured eight members of his family including his mother. Khan...

Six women and children were seriously injured late Monday after a group of unidentified attackers threw grenades and opened fire on a home connected to television correspondent Zafarullah Bonari, according to Pakistani journalists. Bonari, who works for ARY One World Television and Al-Jazeera, was not in the home at the time. The attack, reported initially by the Tribal Union of Journalists, came...

Reporters Without Borders has greeted with relief the news that Riaz Mengal, a reporter with the newspaper "Intikhab", succeeded in escaping from kidnappers who abducted him on 4 October 2007 in the Khuzdar district of Baluchistan province. The journalist told a press conference in Quetta on 26 November, a day after his escape from his captors, that his "kidnapping was linked to articles about...

The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) is gravely concerned for the safety of Pakistani journalist Riaz Mengal who has been missing for 21 days. Before his disappearance, Mengal, who is based in Balochistan, had written articles for the newspaper Intikhab about trafficking of stolen cars. Local reports stated that Mengal received death threats because of his investigation for these...

Amid government measures reinforcing censorship of television and telecommunications, Reporters sans Frontières (RSF) has appealed to President Pervez Musharraf to heed the appeals of Pakistan's journalists, the public and the international community to respect press freedom. "Gen Musharraf, it is not yet too late to rescind the new electronic media ordinance and to put an end to the arbitrary...

Hundreds of protestors took to the streets after the Pakistan government blocked three private television news channels. Geo TV, Ary one TV, and Aaj TV said they had been kept off air because of their coverage of the political crisis over Musharraf's March 9 ouster of the country's chief justice, according to news reports. President Pervez Musharraf Monday imposed fresh curbs on the electronic...