KARACHI: The Jamhoor meeting held at the Karachi Press Club strongly condemned the recent attack on Geo TV in Islamabad and demanded of the government to protect journalists and media houses.

Pakistan Federal Union of Journalists Secretary General Khursheed Abbasi, while presiding over the meeting, said all the political parties should ask their workers not to attack the media persons and media houses, as they discharge their duties under the official coverage assigned to them by their offices.

The parties should refrain from doing such illegal acts, or would face serious repercussions, he added.Members of different parties, speaking on the occasion, said they firmly believed in the supremacy of the Constitution and law. They stressed that the democratic process in the country should not be derailed.

Abbasi said a huge rally, attended by print and electronic media members, will be taken out from the Karachi Press Club very soon to express solidarity with Geo TV.The rally will stage a Dharna in front of the Sindh Assembly building and demand of the government that Geo should be provided complete protection. Those responsible for blocking Geo TV would be requested that people wanted awareness and information, and the largest TV channel — Geo — was facing various kind of hurdles.

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But something curious has happened when arguably one of Pakistan’s most well-known journalist — Hamid Mir — last week joined a long list of hundreds of journalists who have been injured, assaulted, kidnapped, arrested, tortured and/or intimidated since 2000: a passionate war of words has broken out over the airwaves among various media groups on how to deal with the attack and even the otherwise pretty vocal community of working journalists have split down the middle in their strategy to respond to supporting Mir.

How did it come to this? It started with Mir’s brother Amir, himself a journalist working for the same media group Jang, was invited by Geo News to comment on the attack even as his better known sibling fought for his life in a hospital. On air live, Amir did not pull any punches in squarely laying the blame on ISI chief Lt Gen Zaheerul Islam and his colleagues for the murderous attack and made a coherent if not audacious speech in the framework of the civil-military equation. It all ballooned on from there as the focus of the coverage shifted from the incident to the accused. A fairly swift rebuttal of the allegation from the ISPR in defence of the ISI was all that was required for all the other channels to jump into the fray.

From then on there’s a clear position that Jang Group has taken, and more or less another one — driven by targeting of Geo TV — that some other channels have taken, with ARY and Express groups being pretty liberal in taking potshots at Geo for allegedly denigrating the armed forces and intelligence agencies. Such is the pitch of sound bites that principled positions have been lost to the hyperbole of hyper nationalism.

Even the Pakistan Federal Union of Journalists (PFUJ), already divided in three factions, has taken an astonishing position on the issue. Afzal Butt, who heads his faction of the PFUJ, told this writer on Monday that they cannot allow themselves “to be used as a platform” to malign the ISI or the army. “We stand by Hamid Mir and support his constitutional right to seek inquiry against those he suspects but as professionals we should be wary of becoming a party to someone’s personal grudge,” he said. “Supporting Hamid Mir should not mean being anti-armed forces.” There are opposing views. Rana Azeem, the president of another PFUJ faction, says they are opposed to all attacks against the media whatever the motive and whoever the attacker. “The attack on Hamid Mir is audacious. Whoever is allegedly involved in attacking him, irrespective of their rank or standing, should be investigated. We should trust the system to do that and should focus our efforts for now, as journalists, to demand and pursue justice,” he said. “Let’s deal with the culprits, whoever they are, when we find them.”

Despite the enormous goodwill he enjoys, Mir finds himself unwittingly the catalyst of a deepening division within the media ranks. “When Express media group office and its workers were attacked and killed, and others like Raza Rumi and Imtiaz Alam were attacked, they rightly raised a ruckus and demanded justice, as well as support from others. But when a Jang group journalist has been attacked likewise, where is the kind of support from Express for Jang that it sought from others?” asks Iqbal Khattak, the Peshawar-based Executive Director of Freedom Network, a media watchdog advocating for media safety. “There was a time in Pakistan when newspaper owners had a code of ethics that disallowed criticism against each other in each other’s publications. But the advent of real-time TV media has changed all that and we now actually find Jang group, Express group and ARY running active campaigns against each other.”

Rana Jawad, who manages Geo TV operations from Islamabad, insists they are not running a campaign against anyone. “We’ve given views of all sides, including that of the family of Hamid Mir as well as that of the armed forces and intelligence agencies. So where’s the bias? It’s not us running a campaign against anyone whereas there is a clear campaign against us by some media houses with thinly disguised leanings,” he told this writer. “I would say that there is a lack of clarity within [media] ranks on how to deal with pressure from certain quarters and how to prevent us from being manipulated into agendas of non-media forces.”

Media activist and senior journalist Mazhar Abbas says the media sector must take urgent steps to stem the crisis of credibility engulfing it by putting an immediate end to criticism of each other by media houses. “Who do you think benefits from divisions within media owners, media practitioners and government institutions about the attacks against journalists and how to deal with them?” he asks. “Our common enemies, of course.” Abbas says there are precedents of dealing with such attacks.

“In the 1980s three journalists were killed within days of each other and the Council of Pakistan Newspaper Editors and the All Pakistan Newspapers Society (APNS) went on a strike, no newspapers were published in the country and the government was forced to speed up investigation and prosecution. In the 1990s, when six newspapers were banned, we again announced a strike and the government immediately restored the papers. That’s what we need to do now. The APNS, the Pakistan Broadcasters Association and the PFUJ need to stop fighting, appoint a Joint Action Committee and unite on the single agenda of security for journalists, otherwise our enemies will win. It will also solve the current needless media bickering on non-issues.”

Winning the media enemies indeed are. Scores of journalists have been killed in Pakistan since 2000. As media fights its own demons, others pick off media targets one by one. And who’s killing them? Many know and don’t speak out as Mir and his family did but Reporters Without Borders said in a recent report that the Taliban and intelligence services are the biggest predators of media freedoms in Pakistan. The Saleem Shahzad Commission agreed somewhat. And now the Hamid Mir Commission announced by the prime minister has the opportunity to find some answers. But don’t hold your breath.

Adnan Rehmat (adnan@civicaction.pk) is a media analyst and development communications specialist.

DAWN

NEW YORK: The Committee to Protect Journalists, an independent watchdog body, condemned Monday’s attacks on two media houses in Karachi – Nawa-i-Waqt media group and Aaj TV – and called on the authorities concerned to bring the perpetrators to justice.

“We condemn these latest attacks in Karachi and call on the government to ensure safety of journalists and media workers,” CPJ Asia Programme Coordinator Bob Dietz said in a statement. Unidentified assailants on a motorcycle had hurled explosives at the offices of Nawa-i-Waqt media group and Aaj TV, which are half a mile apart in Guru Mandir area, but there were no casualties.

Past investigations into anti-press violence in Pakistan lacked credibility, and perpetrators have rarely been brought to justice, CPJ, the New York-based body, pointed out.

CPJ ranked Pakistan eighth on its 2013 Impunity Index, which spotlights countries where journalists are murdered and their killers go free.

PAKISTAN 5TH MOST DANGEROUS COUNTRY FOR JOURNALISTS

INP adds: One hundred and thirty-four journalists and media support staff were killed while on reporting assignments last year, with Pakistan fifth on the list of countries with nine deaths, the London-based International News Safety Institute (INSI) said. Most of those killed were targeted deliberately. Of these, 65 died covering armed conflicts – primarily in Syria, where 20 were killed, and Iraq, where the death total was 16 – while 51 were killed in peacetime covering issues like crime and corruption, and 18 died in accidents.

After Syria and Iraq, cited by the institute as the most dangerous countries for journalists last year, came Philippines with 14 deaths, India with 13 and Pakistan with 9.

The total was down from 152 deaths recorded in 2012, but there was an accompanying rise in assaults, threats and kidnappings directed at journalists which largely go unreported, said the INSI study, “Killing the Messenger.” The institute, funded by major world news organisations including Reuters, has been issuing the report since 1996. Its main work is providing security training for journalists reporting in dangerous situations.

INSI said local journalists were the main victims, with 123 of the dead while covering their own country. Of the 20 who died in Syria, 16 were Syrian nationals.

“Most journalists were targeted, and shooting was the most common cause of death,” INSI said. The report, compiled for INSI by the Cardiff School of Journalism in Wales, showed 85 of the victims were shot.

Others died in explosions, stabbings and beatings, under torture or by strangulation, or in accidents, according to INSI. In 2012, 28 reporters died in Syria, 18 in Somalia, 12 in Nigeria, 11 in Mexico and 11 in Pakistan.

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