KARACHI: A Russian professor with expertise in international journalism on Wednesday said Pakistan was better placed than Russia and China, though still “least free” on the freedom of press rankings by two prestigious institutions.

Prof Aleksei Bykov, a professor of international journalism associated with the St Petersburg University, Russia, spoke at length on the ‘Lesson on freedom of speech in international journalism’ at the Festival of Arts and Ideas 2018 organised by the Sindh Madressatul Islam University on its campus.

The second edition of the four-day annual festival was inaugurated by SMIU Vice Chancellor Dr Muhammad Ali Shaikh in which delegates from across the country and abroad are participating. ‘Each society must itself decide the question of freedom of speech’

Prof Bykov referred to the World Press Freedom Index 2018 of Reporters Without Borders where Pakistan had a better standing (139th on the list of 180 countries with last entries are the least free) than Russia (148th) and China (176th).

Freedom House’s Freedom of the Press 2017 ranks Pakistan 65th among 100 countries with 100th as the least free. Russia ranks 83rd and China 87th on the list.

‘Imperial interests’

The Russian scholar said those rankings were prestigious for a large population of the world, but there was another opinion in which they were accused of serving certain imperial interests.

He said in Russia, there was a dichotomised model regarding the media where the state had supreme control over the state electronic and print media. However, there was another side where free media outlets worked. He spoke on fresh curbs imposed on the foreign ownership in the Russian media. These curbs reduced the foreign stakes in the country’s media.

He said the print media had a long history as it began in Tsarist Russia; broadcasting began in the Soviet Union while the internet emerged in the post-Soviet era.

Prof Bykov also spoke on the happenings in Turkey after the botched military coup in 2016, trailed by curbs on the media where free speech was being rebranded as “terrorism” and actions by the Erdogan government were aimed at creating a strong state.

He said each society must decide the question of freedom of speech on its own and develop a dialogue to evolve solutions.

‘World is our home’

Stalls were set up by SMIU students on the premises on the theme of ‘World is our home’, depicting various cultures of the world.

Speaking at the inaugural ceremony, Dr Shaikh said the theme ‘World is our home’ was selected as all the people living on the planet formed a single entity.

He said many issues were common among the people living across the borders such as poverty, world peace and climate change. He said world peace could bring prosperity and development in all parts of the world. He was of the view that the biggest bond among all people of the world was humanity. However, he added, it was wrong to say that the era of wars had gone.

Retired Justice Agha Rafique Ahmed highlighted SMIU’s leadership programme and said the programme provided opportunities to its students to visit national and international institutions.

Speaking at the ‘Distinguished lecture series’ programme, Junaid Ismail Makda, president of the Karachi Chamber of Commerce and Industry, said Pakistan had started proceeding in the right direction after peace had been restored after many decades.

In the series of ‘Life of an author’, the life and times of Mirza Ghalib were reviewed by Dr Tanzeem-ul-Firdous of the University of Karachi.

A panel discussion was held on ‘Education as an instrument of social change’. Educationists Dr Mohammad Memon, Prem Sagar, Asif Ikram and Chandni Kumari spoke.

The discussants said during the past couple of decades, education had deteriorated badly, and as a result “we have failed to bring social change”.

They said at present the country was left with infrastructure and not institutions. They added there was a dearth of pedagogical leaders and, sadly, teachers had turned into instructors only. The participants said syllabus being taught to students did not meet the modern-day demands.

Another panel discussion was held on ‘Impacts of climate change on water resources’. Ahmer Bilal Soofi, Tania Saleem, and Naeem A. Mughal were among the panellists.

Dawn

LAHORE: The Joint Action Committee of journalists and media workers on Monday staged demonstrations at Charing Cross and simultaneously on the stairs of the Punjab Assembly building against lay-offs and salary cuts.

A large number of newsmen, cameramen, photojournalists and media workers as well as lawyers and civil society members participated in the protest and chanted slogans against their employers.

JAC convener Azam Chaudhry, members Arshad Ansari, Naeem Hanif, Faisal Durrani, Ziaullah Niazi as well as senior journalists Rana Muhammad Azeem, Raja Riaz, anchors Mubashir Luqman and Arif Hameed Bhatti addressed the protesters. Speakers demanded that the government conduct audit of media houses, explaining the advertisements’ payments as well as taxes paid.

Punjab Information Minister Fayyazul Hassan Chohan, speaking on the floor of the house as well as at the demonstration, asserted that the government had neither cut any advertisement nor reduced advertisement rates during its [so far] two-month tenure. He said advertisements were being issued to newspapers as well as news channels without any interruption.

“It is strongly condemnable, if owners of media houses are sacking and cutting salaries of journalists and media workers on the pretext of suspension of advertisements,” the information minister said.

The minister also invited the JAC members at DGPR on Tuesday (today) 11am to show them the record of government advertisements issued to newspapers and channels during the last two months.

The minister said a code of conduct with regard to the media workers was being prepared, which would eventually be passed by the Punjab Assembly.

According to the code of conduct, he said, any complaint by a journalist or media worker about non-payment of salaries for two or more months would empower the DGPR to suspend advertisements for those media houses. He said the advertisements would be restored only after the complainant would withdraw complaint for being satisfied with the media organisation.

JAC convener Azam Chaudhry said the demonstration marked the beginning of a protest movement and all journalists and media workers bodies would continue to hold protests and also besiege the media houses, owners’ offices as well as their residences.

He announced that the journalists and media workers would hold a sit-in outside Lahore Press Club on a daily basis from Wednesday (tomorrow) at 4pm.

Dawn

Parliamentary journalists of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Assembly on Thursday staged a token walk-out of the house to register protest against the murder of the Haripur based journalist Sohail Khan. The Haripur based journalist had been shot dead after he submitted a formal application with the concerned police station of his district. The deceased was reportedly receiving threats from drug mafia. The incident has triggered a national wide protest of the country community.

After the walkout of the journalists from the Press Gallery of the provincial assembly, Deputy Speaker Mahmood Jan and Advisor to CM for industries, Abdul Karim Khan came out of the house and held negotiations with the protesting journalists.

They were chanting slogans demanding protection for journalist. The recent cold blooded murder of the journalist is second similar incident as another journalist associated with the same organization Bakhshish Elahi was killed six months back.

On the assurance of conducting inquiry and arrest of the accused the journalists ended their boycott of the coverage of the house proceedings.

The Speaker, Mushtaq Ahmad Ghani issued directives to the Inspector General of Police (IGP) for submitting reports to the house tomorrow.

 Business Recorder

Under Threat: The Changing State of Media Safety provides an in-depth, multi-media look at the main changes in the journalistic safety landscape over the past decade. It does this through more than 30 interviews with journalists who work in some of the world’s most dangerous places and the news executives who make the difficult decisions to deploy them.

These interviews were supplemented by a survey of nearly 200 media workers around the world and 10 years of INSI statistics on journalist casualties, revealing the most deadly countries to be a media worker.

“In 2003 we published Dying to Tell the Story, which paid tribute to those journalists killed in the early stages of the Iraq war. After witnessing the horrific murders of our colleagues in places like Syria and Iraq, the insecurity in Ukraine, and the rampant impunity that accompanies the killings of most journalists, INSI felt compelled to look at how different media safety was from a decade ago,” said INSI Director Hannah Storm.

“In an industry under threat from so many different sides, we wanted to know what the main changes and challenges were and what if anything had stayed the same. The results of our research were substantial and deeply sobering.”

The INSI report reveals that:

Journalism has never been more dangerous, and journalists have never felt so unsafe.

Terror groups are using new technologies to control the “information battlefield” and have declared war on journalists.

The frontlines in places like Syria and Iraq have become unclear, meaning journalists don’t know who to trust and where they can go safely.

For their part, news executives aren’t sure who to turn to for information and help when reporters go missing or get hurt in today’s chaotic conflicts.

Technology helps journalists deliver their messages, and in some situations is keeping them safer, but makes them increasingly vulnerable to the powerful entities that seek to track and harm them.

The advent of user-generated content has blurred the role of journalists and confused the industry and general public alike.

Audiences more than ever expect to be instantly and accurately informed about even the remotest corners of our world – pushing journalists into ever more dangerous places.

Please click here for the complete report.

This was Ukraine’s first time in the top five since INSI began keeping casualty records over a decade ago.

Eastern Ukraine has been gripped by violence after protests in the capital Kiev toppled Moscow-backed president Viktor Yanukovich earlier this year, sparking fighting between nationalists and pro-Russia separatists.

At least five members of the news media have been killed in the country’s east over the past two months. Veteran Russian cameraman Anatoly Klyan was killed when the bus he was travelling in, headed towards a Ukrainian military base, came under attack just north of Donetsk. Russian television journalist Igor Kornelyuk and sound engineer Anton Voloshin died after being hit by mortar fire while they were reporting near Lugansk. Italian journalist Andrea Ronchelli was killed alongside his Russian interpreter Andrey Mironov in May as they covered fighting between government forces and pro-Russian insurgents near Slaviansk.

Countless other journalists in the region have been threatened, attacked and kidnapped.

Six journalists have also died in Iraq where government forces and their allies has been battling an insurgency spearheaded by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIS).

Iraq has consistently been among the most dangerous countries for journalists, who are victims of threats and violence from security forces and armed groups. However, the security situation has deteriorated considerably since ISIS began a major offensive in June. Cameraman Khalid Ali of Al-Ahad TV and freelance photographer Kamran Najm Ibrahim both lost their lives in June while covering the fighting between pro-government forces and militants in Diyala province and Kirkuk.

Syria and Pakistan were the third and fourth most dangerous places for journalists, with five members of the news media killed in each country. Syria was the most dangerous country in 2013 and 2012.

Four journalists were killed in Afghanistan in the first six months of the year and three in the Philippines.

The biannual Killing the Messenger report, carried out for INSI by the Cardiff School of Journalism and compiled in cooperation with INSI’s regional contacts, is an analysis of media casualties around the globe. INSI records all deaths, whether deliberate, accidental or health-related, of journalists, media workers and support staff who are killed while on assignment or as a result of an attack on their news organisation.

According to our research, 61 journalists have died carrying out their work so far this year – a worrying rise in the global death toll, as 40 journalists had died by this time in 2013. This latest figure is a conservative estimate as INSI has identified 14 journalists and support staff who also died this year, though it is unclear if their deaths were related to their work in the media.

According to the report, 36 journalists lost their lives in armed conflict situations, with 25 killed in peacetime covering issues such as crime and corruption.

Local journalists bore the brunt of the deadly violence aimed at news media, with 49 killed covering their own country.

Most of the killers of journalists enjoyed complete impunity with suspects identified and arrests made in just seven cases.

INSI calls on all parties in these countries to respect the safety of journalists and allow them to go about their business free from harm or threat of harm.

MOST DANGEROUS COUNTRIES
UKRAINE: 7
IRAQ: 6
SYRIA: 5
PAKISTAN: 5
AFGHANISTAN: 4
PHILIPPINES: 3

EMPLOYER/COMMISSIONER
TV: 23
RADIO: 16
PRESS: 14
NEWS AGENCY: 6
ONLINE: 1
UNKNOWN: 1

STATUS IN COUNTRY
LOCAL: 49
FOREIGN: 12

Other journalist support groups that are members of INSI maintain separate casualty records based on their own criteria including the International Press Institute, the Committee to Protect Journalists and the World Association of Newspapers.

International News Safety Institute

A First Information Report (FIR) is a written document prepared by police organisations in Pakistan when they receive information about the commission of a cognizable offence. An FIR is an important document because it sets the process of criminal justice in motion

An FIR was registered in Balochistan against a major TV news network. Here are some details as given by The Asian Human Rights Organisation’, based in Hong Kong: “An FIR against a leading channel covering news was filed in Balochistan. The Balochistan government has registered a case under the Anti-Terrorism Act against the chief executive and three other employees of a television channel, ARY Digital, for releasing a documentary about the attack on the former residency of the father of the nation. The three other employees are the Executive Director, Owais Tohid, the Quetta bureau chief, Shahid Hameed Rind and the Islamabad bureau chief Sabir Shakir.”

The FIR was a shocker. Almost all media men vocally and emphatically denounced the move. Dr Danish of ARY digital was seen at the top of his histrionics, denouncing the Balochistan government, and in particular Chief Minister Malik Baloch for such an action. He almost clearly felt betrayed for having laid confidence on a ‘commoner’, Mr Malik on becoming the chief minister. Dr Danish found almost every reputed journalist standing firmly in his support and so did the majority of the civil society.

There is indeed no doubt about the fact that the freedom of press and freedom of information is the key to a healthy society as well as a healthy democracy. It is also true that both, particularly the media, have a very high responsibility on what they communicate and what perceptions they create. Unfortunately, the media in Pakistan is no less immature than the democracy. The media barons, and their wiz kids often race for communication leadership trampling the flowers of decency, grace, sensitivities, moderation and ethics. In this perspective the role of the media has been barely adequate. However, the media built itself into a huge power. Some media persons reaped rich personal harvest as well. The ones who oblige are those who find themselves vulnerable, for example the politicians, businessmen, even crooks. This is where discretion only shows the moral integrity of the individual or his institution. Media is a formidable force, it yields huge power and in proportion to its power exist the possibilities of inherent corruption in it.

In the recent years the media in general and some specific journalists and channels had a rollicking honeymoon with the judiciary and the Supreme Court in particular. This affinity increased the power of both. This honeymoon was enjoyed by both and if anyone had a complaint, he or she, preferred to gulp it for fear of repercussions and even the ‘contempt of court’ proceedings.

This honeymoon bond between the two powerful institutions, the judiciary and media, continued for quite a long time, but some hairline fractures are becoming noticeable. Both are beginning to look at each other with caution. Journalists are compelled to associate with ground realities as these appear and one of these realities is the increasing criticism of the conduct of the Supreme Court, including the frequency and choice of its suo motu. A Supreme Court, which has been used to absolute praise, bordering on flattery, has been surprised at the criticisms, and the eyebrows have risen. One is now compelled to ask: is the honeymoon going to be over?

Let us look at the latter part of the newspaper reports: Dr Abdul Malik Baloch said he had been told that the case was registered on the directives of the Supreme Court, but the registrar of the apex court later clarified that the court had not issued any directive for filing a case against the private TV channel on charges of showing footage of the attack on the Quaid’s residency at Ziarat in June.

The statement by CM Balochistan and some others indicates some sort of a go-ahead by the Supreme Court. It may be proved wrong in the investigation, but many would continue to believe that there is little love lost between the Supreme Court and the media community now.

In any case no honeymoon between powerful institutions is good. The judiciary and journalism are both extremely noble professions. Fortunately, the judiciary is more trained, even better educated, and groomed to maintain its bearings. Journalism has had a big burst in a short time in Pakistan. Most of the journalists are in the learning process as to how this power is to be handled and what their social responsibility is. A conscientious journalist will watch every word he writes and every second that he/she communicates from the screen. The business has to be much more than financial competition. It is about social responsibility, information, education and nationalism. There were lessons in the work of Faiz Ahmed Faiz, Hamid Sheikh and men of that stature. There may still be some of my age group (really few I suppose) who have survived and could provide a lesson or two from their works. The political comments need even greater sense of responsibility. For the owners who are in for a buck and blackmail power that cannot be expected from them. The genuine media owners must make the decision as to what side they want to be. No honeymoon is proper in such noble professions as the judiciary and journalism. The relationship needs to be of mutual respect but not compromising on principles.

In any case apart from the philosophies or ethics, it is just not right that the police be sent after the media while more civil recourses are available. Whoever did it should not have done it and it was good that the journalist community stood by each other, but it will be wrong if this community gets intoxicated by its power.

The writer is the former CEO Pakistan National Council of the Arts; Chairman Fruit processing Industries; Chairman UNESCO Theatre Institute Pakistan and COO ICTV, USA. He is the author of Melluhas of the Indus Valley 8000BC to 500 BC. He can be reached at naeemtahir37@gmail.com

Daily Times