ISLAMABAD: Former prime minister Nawaz Sharif’s security guards assaulted and injured the cameraman of a private news channel outside Parliament House on Monday.

Mr Sharif met his brother Opposition Leader in the National Assembly Shahbaz Sharif and senior PML-N leaders, including ex-prime minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi and former speaker National Assembly Sardar Ayaz Sadiq, besides attending a meeting of the party.

As he was leaving the Parliament House, journalists and cameramen rushed towards him.

When the cameraman of Samaa TV, Syed Wajid Ali, approached Mr Sharif, one of the security guards pushed him so violently that he fell on the ground.

Another guard then ran towards him and jumped on the head of the fallen cameraman. Journalists present at the scene then rushed towards the injured cameraman who had fallen unconscious.

The two security guards tried to board a vehicle of Mr Sharif’s motorcade but the journalists caught them. In the meantime, Mr Sharif’s cavalcade left the premises. National Assembly speaker orders registration of case against security guards

Other people present at the scene got the guards freed but later one of them was captured again and handed over to the sergeant-at-arms of the Parliament House while the other managed to escape.

The cameraman was taken to Polyclinic from where he was referred to Pims and kept under observation.

In protest, mediapersons closed the main gate of the Parliament House and stopped lawmakers from entering the building. They demanded legal action against the security guards.

National Assembly Speaker Asad Qaiser ordered registration of a case against the security guards. Besides, he also imposed a ban on the entry of private security guards in the Parliament House. The speaker ordered that in future no one would be allowed to enter the Parliament House with security guards.

Secretariat Police Station House Officer (SHO) Inspector Asjad Mehmood told Dawn that a medico-legal certificate of the injured had been sought from the hospital.

“He is being examined by doctors who would issue the certificate after which the case would be registered against the security guards,” he added.

One of the security guards is in the custody of the sergeant-at-arms in the Parliament House and would soon be taken into custody for further legal action, he added.

“The guards of Mr Sharif attacked and injured the cameraman when the latter was performing duty and tried to make a video of his departure from the Parliament House,” the SHO added.

When contacted, Samaa’s Bureau Chief Khalid Azeem said the cameraman was making footage of Mr Sharif’s departure when the security guards assaulted him.

“He was performing his duty which is neither a security breach nor privacy breach,” he added.

It is the fourth incident in which the PML-N leader targeted the staff of Samaa TV, Mr Azeem said, adding: “It seems to be preplanned. We air factual news and if anyone has objection over it he should rectify himself,” he added.

Opposition Leader in the National Assembly and PML-N President Shahbaz Sharif, while speaking on the floor of the house, tendered apology to the cameraman.

He also assured the house that he and his party would not come in the way of the legal course of action.

In a statement issued by PML-N, Nawaz Sharif condemned the incident.

“As soon as I came to know about the incident I directed my party leaders to take the cameraman to hospital and make arrangements for his treatment,” Mr Sharif said.

He said he and his party had immense respect for all journalists, camerapersons and photographers.

“I will not tolerate any individual in my staff who is found guilty of mistreating a person in such a way. We will ensure that this sort of regrettable, condemnable incident never happens in future.”

PML-N spokesperson Marriyum Aurangzeb met the injured cameraman at Polyclinic.

In a statement, she said Mr Sharif had taken strict notice of the incident and the security guard would be punished.

Ms Aurangzeb said Mr Sharif had personally asked her to supervise the treatment of the injured.

Dawn

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Business Recorder: Attack on cameramen in parliament’s premises unfortunate: Fawad

ISLAMABAD: Federal Minister for Information and Broadcasting Fawad Chaudhry Thursday said the federal cabinet had decided to release all the outstanding amounts to the media organisations at the federal level.He said this while briefing the media on the decisions of the federal cabinet which met under Prime Minister Imran Khan at the Prime Minister Office (PMO) here. The minister said the federal government had decided to integrate 193 state-owned enterprises which were mostly running in difficulties in the newly established Sarmaia Pakistan Company (SPC) for their rehabilitation.

The prime minister will head the SPC’s board of governors, while three federal ministers will be its member.

Top professionals from various fields will be hired to become part of board of governors. The cabinet also took up the question of tenure for appointment of bureaucrats and it was decided that it should be linked with their performance and not political connections.

A committee has been formed to look into the affairs of tenures of bureaucrats. The cabinet committee that will be headed by Prime Minister’s Adviser on Establishment Muhammad Arbab Shehzad will submit its report to the federal cabinet.

Federal ministers Pervez Khattak, Shaikh Rasheed Ahmad and Prime Minister’s Adviser on Institutional Reforms Dr. Ishrat Hussain will be the other members of the committee. The federal cabinet discussed overall political and economic situation prevailing in the country.

The cabinet also decided that Prime Minister Imran Khan would share with the nation the headway made in the first 100 days by his government on November 29 and brief them about the achievements of government in various sectors during the first hundred days.

He said the cabinet had dilated upon the issue of tenure safety of senior bureaucrats in detail. A suggestion has been made that federal secretaries should be provisionally appointed for a period of six months at a ministry and after successful completion of that period their appointment will be extended for two and a half years. During this period, they will not be transferred or removed from their positions.

He said Prime Minister Imran Khan firmly believed that bureaucracy should be free from any political interference. The minister said the appointment of bureaucrats should be linked with their performance and not political connections.

The minister said the cabinet took decision about the rehabilitation of 193 state-owned enterprises by deciding to incorporate SPC. Prime Minister will head the Board of Governors of this company while three ministers will be its members.

Top professionals from various fields will be hired to become part of board of governors. It will look into the affairs of all state-owned enterprises and will give suggestions to cabinet for running these on professional lines.

Fawad said the cabinet also discussed the case of Afsheen Bakhsh, a Danish woman of Pakistani descent, whose two daughters were forcibly brought to Pakistan against the ruling of a Danish court.

“It has been decided that a barrister will do the preliminary inquiry and then a final decision will be made on the minor girls’ stay in Pakistan or their repatriation to Denmark, as we respect the decisions of foreign courts,” Fawad said.

Fawad said the government was committed to bringing Dr. Aaafia Siddiqui back and all necessary efforts will be made in this regard. He said the cabinet had decided to defer the budget of National Technology Council till its approval by the Economic Coordination Committee.

He said the cabinet had decided to centralise the process of procurement of equipment for e-governance which was earlier devolved to ministries. The information minister said the cabinet had decided to give acting charge of PTDC to Ijaz Khan besides giving approval for appointment of the Security Exchange Commission of Pakistan (SECP) commissioners.

The cabinet also took into consideration the issues faced by the urea sector and decided to import 50,000 ton urea to meet the shortfall. The cabinet decided not to change the price of wheat that was Rs1,300 per maund.

Fawad said the cabinet had also discussed the ruling of chairman Senate and the prime minister had expressed his dissatisfaction on the issue. The federal cabinets expressed grief over the assassination of SP Police Tahir Khan Dawar and prayed for the departed soul.

The News

Related Story 

The Nation: Call for removing Fawad as information minister

ISLAMABAD – At least 26 journalists were killed in Pakistan during the last five years for their journalism work but only the cases of 16 journalists went to court for trial and of which the prosecution and trial was concluded in six cases and conviction handed down in one case only.

This was revealed in a new research study tracking and examining the failure of the justice system in prosecuting and punishing the killers of all journalists killed in Pakistan during May 2013 and May 18, released here on the eve of the International Day to End Impunity for Crimes against Journalists observed by the United Nations on November 2 every year.

The impunity enjoyed by the killers of journalists in Pakistan is one of the highest in the world and the murdered journalists and their families have received justice in only one of the 26 cases, and in this case also a conviction was handed down by a lower court, but the accused was able to get the sentence overturned at the high court level.

“Journalists continue to get target killed and threats against them continue to grow and the State’s legal system (police failure) and justice system (courts failure) have failed to provide them justice,” Iqbal Khattak, the Executive Director of Freedom Network said on the occasion to urge all stakeholders of media to join hands to fight back deep-rooted impunity for crimes against journalists and media.

“This means the killers enjoy total impunity with no fear of getting punished for killing journalists. Journalists are dead and their killers are free,” he  added.

The study further said ‘Impunity of Crimes Against Journalists Pakistan Report 2018’ has been produced by Freedom Network, a national independent organization that monitors attacks against journalists and works on journalists’ safety issues is titled “Crime and Punishment in Pakistan’s Journalism World, Zero Justice for Pakistan’s 26 Murdered Journalists.”

The report, the first of its kind focusing on impunity of crimes against journalists based on a special impunity index developed by Freedom Network and by examining the FIRs of journalists and interviews with the families, lawyers and former colleagues of the murdered journalists revealed the following startling findings,

The study also revealed that newspaper journalists (18 of 26 killed) are three times most vulnerable than TV journalists (8 killed). Punjab is the most dangerous province in Pakistan to practice journalism (8 killed) followed by Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (7 killed). Print journalists are at most risk of being murdered if they are based in Punjab (6 killed) and KP (6 killed) and TV journalists if they are based in Sindh (4 killed) and Punjab (2 killed).  The most murderers of journalists remain faceless and unidentified. The threat sources are identified/suspected by the victims and their families in only one in every three cases of journalists murdered and worryingly include state actors, political parties and religious groups.  In 60 per cent of the cases the police fail to complete the investigations into the murder of a journalist to generate a final challan or a full investigation report to submit before a court for trial. It also said the killer of only one of the 26 journalists murdered in the period 2013-18 was convicted (3.5 per cent). The only case of conviction of an accused killer was at the district court level in KP after which he successfully challenged the conviction at the high court level.

The Nation

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The News: No one convicted as 26 journalists killed in Pakistan

ISLAMABAD: Journalists of Rawalpindi and Islamabad continued their protest for a second day on Wednesday by setting up a pakora stall in front of the Parliament House to protest termination of services of journalists and workers by different media organisations.

Nuzhat Pathan, a Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf MNA from Sindh, visited the camp and held out an assurance to the protesters that she would take up the matter in the National Assembly.

The PTI leader said strong media was necessary for a strong country and promotion of democratic values.

Ms Pathan regretted the retrenchment of journalists and workers and non-payment of salaries to those media workers who were still working in some organisations and said that such a situation would weaken an important pillar of the state.

PPP leader Akhunzada Chattan expressed solidarity with media workers by purchasing pakoras from the camp and said he and his party had always stood for freedom of expression and free media.

The protesters were led by Afzal Butt, president of his own faction of the Pakistan Federal Union of Journalists (PFUJ), and leaders of the Rawalpindi-Islamabad Union of Journalists.

Speaking on the occasion, Mr Butt said journalists were being sacked cruelly and this move of media organisations had created serious economic problems for media workers. He urged the government to address the issue.

Television anchor Saleem Safi suggested that managements of TV channels should cut salaries of anchors instead of sacking low-paid employees.

Dawn

ISLAMABAD: An official of Radio Pakistan was found dead in the Koral police jurisdiction on Saturday.

According to police, the deceased was identified as Muhammad Ilyas, deputy controller of news at Radio Pakistan.

His body was found in Ghauri Town Phase-V, according to Investigation Officer Ashfaq Ahmed. He said the body was recovered on Saturday morning, when a passerby found it and notified the police.

The police said that there were no marks on his body, however, a post-mortem was not conducted at his family’s request.

Express Tribune

The workshop titled as “Safety and Security Training workshop for Journalists”, will bring together more than 25 journalists from more than 10 districts of Khyber Pakhtunkhuwa and Punjab provinces, including Hangu, Peshawar, Kohat, Jamrud, D.I Khan, Swat, Abbotabad, Mardan, Mansehra, Multan, Islamabad and Rawalpindi.

First day of the training workshop is designed to provide journalists with first hand training about coverage of incidents related civil disturbance. Second day provides with first aid and trauma/mental health training whereas, third day focuses on sexual harassment and digital security.

Prior to this training workshop, PPF and FPU have conducted 5 successful residential and non-residential Safety and Security Training workshops for Journalists in 5 districts of Sindh province.

Pakistan Press Foundation

A statement issued by CRCP secretary general Mian Abrar Hafeez praised the committee and the information ministry for including almost all proposals presented by the commission during a recent roundtable discussion on the Federal Right to Information (RTI) Bill and the role of ombudsmen.

Keeping in view the poor state of governance, transparency and accountability, all provinces should take steps to enact effective RTI laws.

He said Sindh and Balochistan should follow the precedent set by Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Punjab and now the centre by amending old and ineffective laws.

Mian Abrar said the right to information law was a strong tool to improve governance, eradicate corruption and enhance transparency and accountability.

Proper implementation of RTI laws could help free flow of information and facilitate citizens’ meaningful involvement in decision-making, he said. He urged civil society and the media to join hands to make the RTI regime successful.

DAWN

Noorani was sent abusive messages and threats by a retired brigadier of the Pakistan Army Tarik Niazi on Twitter and Facebook. The account used by Brigadier (retd) Tarik Niazi is a known account which he usually uses to run different campaigns and spread messages.

Tarik Niazi in his threatening and abusive message said that he was in Islamabad and invited the journalist to meet him to settle scores. However, some sources say that Niazi often stays in Canada and initially belongs to Rawalpindi.

The journalist’s complaint to FIA also discusses three threatening calls made between 2310 hrs and 2336 hrs on April 12, 2014 on his home mobile number. The mobile number used to make threatening calls 0333-1212346 was also given to the FIA with all relevant details.

Identifying and tracing any person using a cell number is quite easy and now it is up to the FIA to investigate, arrest all criminals and also inform the general public about the matter as some circles also insist that all these attempts to harass journalists could also be a move to malign and defame the institution of the Pak Army by some vested interests.

It should be noted that Noorani received threatening calls a day after Editor Investigations of The News Ansar Abbasi received a threatening email. Ansar complained to the FIA immediately but no official of the agency contacted the senior journalist despite the passage of almost 48 hours.

The News

He shared this information during the deliberations of the Senate’s Standing Committee on Information and Broadcasting here at the PTV Headquarters. The secretary said there was no need for obtaining an NoC from anywhere with regards to the proposed piece of legislation.

The matter was raised by Senator Farhatullah Babar and wondered why not it was taken up by the government as already 60 mandatory days had already passed. Babar said they had learnt that a ministry was impeding forward the movement of the initiative and had asked for not pursuing the proposed law as it was opposed to a particular part of it.

He urged the government to take particular care of the bill as the Senate committee had expressed no objection to it being tabled as a government bill.

The News

Although writing a report about parties harbouring militant wings is not possible for a journalist without risking his or her personal safety, the attacks on journalists have increased with the passage of time as the federal and provincial governments watch as silent spectators.

While a woman host of a talk-show fled the city in early August following a call intercepted by the intelligence agencies revealing a murder plot to be carried out by four target killers, a male journalist has recently been brutalised and told to leave the city. Both incidents happened in August and were publicized although it is hard to ascertain how many journalists have quietly left the city under threat.

In the first case, the police had informed the woman journalist about the life-threats after she did programmes on the mass-scale rigging in Karachi on election day. In the other case, a journalist was kidnapped by policemen on August 30 who later handed him over to another group who roughed him up.

The involvement of the police in such activities coincides with an admission by the IG Sindh before Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif during a recent briefing that around 6,000 criminals were which needed to teach him a lesson. He was released after 10-hour captivity and his driver is still missing.

“They accused me of betraying the ethnic community I belong to,” he told The News in Islamabad, his latest destination, adding they criticized him for creating misunderstandings between a political party and a state institution.

“They warned me against writing anything about domestic politics and advised me to write only about international issues,” he explained. He was also accused of feeding information to Chirya, a reference to Geo TV’s talk show host, Najam Sethi.

As they asked him to quit Karachi, he told them that he would follow their order. Asked where he would go, he said he planned to settle in London, a reply that provoked them into his further beating and was asked to move to a city within Pakistan.

He was later dumped on roadside and the passersby informed the police which, instead of helping him, demanded Rs 50,000, and said failing to do so would land him in jail as a terrorist. They gave up the extortion demand only after he told them about his relation with an SHO of the area, nevertheless, the police forced him pay them Rs2,000 as petrol expenses.

In the lady host’s case, fingers were also pointed towards the political party which categorically rejected any role. She also moved to Islamabad and wrote a blog explaining the reasons behind her decision to quit Karachi.

After eye-witnessing massive rigging at the polling stations where she went to cast her vote but could not, she said she did a number of talk shows highlighting this issue. Later she went to Saudi Arabia for Umra and found her house surrounded by police upon return to Karachi.

As soon as I opened my cell phone after returning to my home, she wrote, the first call I received was by SP of her area. He said only one sentence “Madam where were you? Please don’t leave your house. I am on my way.” The Police and intelligence agencies men came to my house shortly, she explained.

“I was told by them that they had intercepted telephone calls detailing that four target killers had been assigned to target me or my family and the attack would be made to look like a robbery at gun point.”

According to all intelligence reports, all the terrorists belonged to the largest ethnic political party of Karachi, her blog reads. A delegation of the political party visited her residence after she contacted it about the calls intercepted by the intelligence agencies. The party delegates refuted the report.

She then asked herself: “I was unsure who to believe? My saviours had become my enemies? Were the agencies pitting me against a political party to play their proxy wars? Or was this whole thing the truth?”

Soon after this shocking news, she sent her brother back to Canada and moved her ailing mother to an undisclosed city before flying to Islamabad where she brought the issue to the notice of Prime Minister during his meeting with TV anchors.Besides meeting the PM, she wrote: “I met Interior Minister and DG ISI but my all efforts went into vain.”

The News