The attack and shootout in April this year, left Mir, seriously injured. Mr. Hamid Mir, one of Geo TV’s most famed anchor-persons has directly accused the ISI chief for the attack and conspiracy to assassinate him and to silence any critique of the ISI or its agents.

Although Geo TV has tendered an official apology several times, following the airing, reports revealed that the ISI forced the hand of both the PEMRA and the Ministry of Defence to take punitive actions against Geo TV, and to send out a powerful message that no criticism of the ISI nor any of its agents will be tolerated in Pakistan.

The AHRC has learns that, the regulatory body PEMRA, under virtual coercion by the ISI , has taken the decision to close down Geo TV with only members from government being called by the PEMRA’s Chairperson and just hours before the announcement of the ban.

The AHRC notes with concern that this issue is seen as a serious threat to media freedom in Pakistan by the Government, the army and the intelligence agencies. According to reports, Geo TV and its sister channels have been taken off air by cable TV operators, under pressure from the military, that four of the company’s vehicles were burned in different stations across the country and that a journalist, has been beaten up by unidentified assailants in the city of Multan in central Pakistan, even before Friday’s ban was announced.

Further, the federal minister of Defence in a televised interview had issued a warning to all media institutions in the country, threatening that if any person or institution found maligning the armed forces would be strictly dealt with. He had added further that the punishment meted out to Geo TV was not severe enough. The attacks on media and press freedom had escalated to highest proportions following these recent events that other government Ministers too, have been reported to have baselessly criticised media institutions in reporting the recent attacks on the Karachi airport, for exposing the weaknesses and failures of the military and the government authorities in handling these terrorist attacks.

The deterioration of media freedom in Pakistan is fast transforming into a deeper crisis as the judiciary too has been reported to have joined the intelligence services and the government military and intelligence apparatus in restricting media freedom in Pakistan. In another incident a Judge of the Islamabad High Court, a well-known vigilante for his affiliation with fundamentalist groups and was had been biased in favour of killing of the former governor of Punjab on blasphemy, has banned an anchor-person, Mr. Mubashir Luqman, from yet another TV channel in Pakistan, the ARY TV, from conducting any programmes on air due to him exposing to a fraudulent land deal by a wife of a judge of the Supreme Court of Pakistan.

The attacks on media freedom in Pakistan do not end here. According to sources, the Pakistan government is in the process of drafting a code of conduct for the media which will drastically limit the space and scope of freedom of expression. The code of conduct declares that no media house will be allowed to criticize the armed forces and their intelligence agencies without prior confirmation and worse will not be allowed to criticize any decisions of the courts.

The freedom of expression in Pakistan is in a perilous state and continues to worsen every day, by constantly being under government’s close watch , by constant military interference and by constant threats by the intelligence services. No criticism, even credible allegations against any of these government establishments are met with heavy reprisals against the media.

The fragile state of the country’s media freedom is further demonstrated by the constant harassment of journalists, which even go beyond harassment and take their lives. Publications are being constantly censored, websites are being blocked, and legislation is being passed in total disregard of all fundamental rights.

Legislations such as the Official Secret Act of 1923 and other blasphemy laws have generated much disgust among the people of Pakistan. Pakistan’s Constitution enshrines in Article 19 the freedom of speech and expression – which the state has miserably failed to uphold. Pakistan is also obliged under Article 19 of the United Nations International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights [ICCPR] to ensure freedom of expression and speech – none of which is presently being followed by the Pakistan government. Article 19 of the ICCPR also makes it mandatory for the countries to guarantee the undiluted freedom of expression even during times of war or war like conditions.

In this backdrop the Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) urges the government of Pakistan to ensure and respect the very constitutional guarantees of freedom expression and speech to all citizens. We also urge the government of Pakistan to adhere to its international obligations and to actively desist any moves by the military and its intelligence agents to curb the freedom of expression and speech in Pakistan.

The AHRC urges the government to restore the three channels of Geo TV immediately and guarantee freedom of expression for the media institution, order PEMRA to have a credible, transparent and democratic process in all its regulatory functions, take disciplinary action and conduct an impartial inquiry on the conduct of Justice Shoukat Siddiqui, judge of Islamabad high court for usurping the right of freedom of expression of journalist/anchor-person Mubashir Luqman – with immediate effect.

Asian Human Rights Commission

The order was rapidly disowned by PEMRA in a press release that said it was issued following a meeting yesterday of only five PEMRA members that did not comply with Rule 3(4) of PEMRA Rules 2009, under which at least seven of PEMRA’s 12 members must attend a meeting for it to be validly convened.

The release added that the decision that PEMRA took at an earlier, valid meeting on 9 May to “refer the [Geo Television] case to the Ministry of Law for legal opinion” was therefore still in effect.

The case was referred to PEMRA last month by defence minister Khawaja Muhammad Asif, who was seeking legal redress against Geo News for reporting allegations that Pakistan’s intelligence agencies were behind a shooting attack on Geo News anchor Hamid Mir in Karachi on 19 April.

“The hasty decision by three PEMRA members that was immediately disowned is indicative of a desire by certain government representatives to use any means, including illegal ones, to ban Geo News from broadcasting,” said Benjamin Ismaïl, the head of the head of the Reporters Without Borders Asia-Pacific desk.

“We urge PEMRA not to yield to pressure from the intelligence agencies and the defence ministry, and to ensure that the law protects freedom of information.”

Mir has been the target of repeated threats, intimidation and prosecution as a result of his coverage of the activities of Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), Pakistan’s leading intelligence agency, in the southwestern province of Baluchistan.

He shared his fears with Reporters Without Borders and his brother, Amir Mir, saying that if he was the target of any attack, “the ISI and its chief, Lt. Gen. Zaheerul Islam, should be held responsible.”

After Mir’s brother repeated Mir’s statements on Geo News in the wake of the 19 April attack, the TV station was accused of broadcasting unpatriotic accusations and was the target of smear campaign in the following weeks.

The climate for employees of the Jang/Geo media group has deteriorated dramatically, with journalists working for Geo News and the newspaper Jang receiving repeated threats, including death threats.

A note left at the Jang printing press on 5 May accused Jang and Geo News employees of being “anti-Pakistan, anti-Islam, anti-Army” and threatened Jang with “serious consequences” if it did not close its Peshawar offices. Employees were also told to “quit and leave the traitor group immediately.”

The Sunni Ittehad Council, an Islamic political party, announced on 15 May that it regarded Geo News as “haram” (forbidden) and called for its prohibition for broadcasting “blasphemous” content.

Pakistan is ranked 158th out of 180 countries in the 2014 Reporters Without Borders press freedom index.

Reporters Without Borders

Freedom is a heady wine, and once tasted, the desire for more grows exponentially. This is what has transformed the media scene in Pakistan over the last decade or more. However, freedom if exercised without responsibility is no longer just an inebriant, in excess it becomes poison. Something along these lines has emerged in Pakistan in recent years. First, a certain myth that has gained currency and traction in Pakistan for some time needs to be laid to rest. During the 18th century, the press came to be dubbed the fourth estate in Europe, principally in Britain and France (which was undergoing its Revolution). Estates were categories of communities in society that could be treated as a group because of shared interests. Thus in France, the monarchy, aristocracy, peasantry, etc, were dubbed estates. The rise of the press in the 18th century (its role in the French Revolution is well documented) produced the title of fourth estate for it. Unfortunately this has been translated wrongly in Pakistan as the ‘fourth pillar of the state’. Wrong as the notion is, since the press (media) is not part of the state but arguably located somewhere between (and perhaps bridging) political and civil society as a watchdog of the people’s interests in an inherently adversarial relationship with the state, governments of the day, and authority in general, it has had the inadvertent effect, particularly since 2002, of giving the media the false notion of more power than the ground realities suggest. If this has gone to the heads of certain sections of the media, the nature of things would tend to dictate a correction is due sooner or later. We have argued in this space consistently that there is no such thing as freedom without responsibility, and any such untrammeled freedom cannot be long lasting. Unfortunately, along with the decline of the institution of professional editor, adventurism based on false notions of excessive empowerment has crept into sections of the media. Whatever the mistakes or lapses of such sections, the other tragedy is the manner in which the Hamid Mir affair has brought the split in the media on the basis of professional rivalry out into the open. Some media houses have chosen to use the opportunity of the difficulties the group Hamid Mir belongs to to attack it roundly on the basis of being anti-national, unpatriotic, and even anti-state. It is not for the media to act as prosecutor, judge, jury and executioner in such matters. The lack of solidarity amongst media houses and the journalists associated with them is likely in the long run to damage all of us in the profession.

Since the defence ministry has chosen to take its complaint to NEPRA, justice demands that the process be allowed to play itself out according to the law and rules, and the channel be allowed to fight its case without others in the field nipping away at its heels. We may or may not agree with the approach and policies of one media group or the other or even individual journalists, but this should not blind us to the need to stand in solidarity with victim Hamid Mir and his media group that has collaterally been pinioned in the dock.

Daily Times

Freedom is a heady wine, and once tasted, the desire for more grows exponentially. This is what has transformed the media scene in Pakistan over the last decade or more. However, freedom if exercised without responsibility is no longer just an inebriant, in excess it becomes poison. Something along these lines has emerged in Pakistan in recent years. First, a certain myth that has gained currency and traction in Pakistan for some time needs to be laid to rest. During the 18th century, the press came to be dubbed the fourth estate in Europe, principally in Britain and France (which was undergoing its Revolution). Estates were categories of communities in society that could be treated as a group because of shared interests. Thus in France, the monarchy, aristocracy, peasantry, etc, were dubbed estates. The rise of the press in the 18th century (its role in the French Revolution is well documented) produced the title of fourth estate for it. Unfortunately this has been translated wrongly in Pakistan as the ‘fourth pillar of the state’. Wrong as the notion is, since the press (media) is not part of the state but arguably located somewhere between (and perhaps bridging) political and civil society as a watchdog of the people’s interests in an inherently adversarial relationship with the state, governments of the day, and authority in general, it has had the inadvertent effect, particularly since 2002, of giving the media the false notion of more power than the ground realities suggest. If this has gone to the heads of certain sections of the media, the nature of things would tend to dictate a correction is due sooner or later. We have argued in this space consistently that there is no such thing as freedom without responsibility, and any such untrammeled freedom cannot be long lasting. Unfortunately, along with the decline of the institution of professional editor, adventurism based on false notions of excessive empowerment has crept into sections of the media. Whatever the mistakes or lapses of such sections, the other tragedy is the manner in which the Hamid Mir affair has brought the split in the media on the basis of professional rivalry out into the open. Some media houses have chosen to use the opportunity of the difficulties the group Hamid Mir belongs to to attack it roundly on the basis of being anti-national, unpatriotic, and even anti-state. It is not for the media to act as prosecutor, judge, jury and executioner in such matters. The lack of solidarity amongst media houses and the journalists associated with them is likely in the long run to damage all of us in the profession.

Since the defence ministry has chosen to take its complaint to NEPRA, justice demands that the process be allowed to play itself out according to the law and rules, and the channel be allowed to fight its case without others in the field nipping away at its heels. We may or may not agree with the approach and policies of one media group or the other or even individual journalists, but this should not blind us to the need to stand in solidarity with victim Hamid Mir and his media group that has collaterally been pinioned in the dock.

Daily Times

On April 22, 2014 the federal Ministry of Defence filed a reference with Pakistan Electronic Media Regulatory Authority (PEMRA) for tarnishing the image of ISI. PEMRA, which has the authority to suspend or cancel the broadcast licenses, issued a show cause notice asking the Geo administration to submit its reply within 14 days. Pemra also directed chief executive of Geo News to appear in person on May 6.

Geo has challenged the notice by Pemra in the Sindh High Court, which has issued notices to the federal government and has fixed May 2 for hearing.

Tensions rose between ISI and Geo after the channel broadcast allegations by Mir’s brother that the journalist had told his family, employers, government and army officials that some officials of ISI including its Director General, Lt. Gen Zaheerul Islam had prepared a plan to eliminate him.

Geo reported that cable operators have blocked Geo’s transmissions in military cantonment areas and newspaper vendors in these areas have been directed not distribute newspaper of the group. Geo has also alleged that these ‘illegal’ actions have been taken on orders of ‘some forces’.

The Council of Pakistan Newspapers Editors (CPNE) in an emergency meeting unanimously declared that closure of any media house or cancellation of licence of any channel or publication will not be acceptable. CPNE said such action will lead to a grave crisis and will do irreparable harm to the democratic Pakistan. The meeting also declared that the right to freedom of speech is enshrined in the Constitution of Pakistan and the state should provide adequate protection to journalists against threats from any quarter.

The meeting strongly condemned the attack on Mir and demanded that the government to take immediate and swift action to ensure the safety of all the media persons.

Pakistan Press Foundation

More than a hundred bouquets line the lobby of the private ward of Karachi’s posh, private Aga Khan Hospital. Outside, dozens of policemen with bulletproof vests and automatic weapons look at every visitor suspiciously, officers speaking urgently into their walkie-talkies. The Karachi police force is really good at strutting about after a high-profile crime has happened. One of the largest bouquets in the lobby is from the force. “Get well Hamid Mir,” it says. “We may not be able to protect you,” it implies, “but we know where to order the best flowers.”

Mir is upstairs recuperating. He took six bullets – in the ribs, thigh, stomach and across his hand – in an assassination attempt on Saturday as he came out of the airport to present a special broadcast on Geo, Pakistan’s largest news channel. Mir had warned about a possible assassination. He had also named his would-be killers. That’s what his brother claims, that’s what his colleagues and managers at the channel say. Geo, just after the attack, broadcast the allegation and, in an unprecedented move, also flashed the picture of the accused: the head of Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence chief, Lieutenant General Zaheer ul-Islam. In that picture he comes across as a big man. We are not supposed to know much about him except the fact that he is a very professional general. According to an internet myth very popular in Pakistan, the ISI has been rated as the world’s No 1 intelligence agency: Mossad is No 5 and MI6 languishes at No 9. According to television ratings, the man with three bullets still in his body is Pakistan’s top-rated TV journalist and one of the most vocal critics of Pakistan’s military and intelligence agencies.

One of the modest bouquets wishing Mir a full and speedy recovery is from the prime minister of Pakistan, Nawaz Sharif, who visited him in the hospital earlier this week after announcing a judicial inquiry. Going by the history of judicial inquiries in Pakistan, Sharif seemed to be saying: “Look Hamid, we want you to get well but don’t really expect us to find out who tried to kill you. Who is going to go and ask a working general? Meanwhile, here are three senior judges who will help you get over the whole thing.”

The day after the assassination attempt, Pakistan’s army chief General Raheel Sharif visited the ISI headquarters to show that he stands with his intelligence boss.

And the very next day, the Defence Ministry recommended that the channel for which Mir works should be shut down for bringing a national institution into disrepute. Geo’s competitors have joined the chorus.

For years, Pakistan has been one of the world’s most dangerous countries for journalists. From feudal landlords to Taliban fighters, sectarian groups to separatists, all have killed journalists. The question one needs to ask is: does the ISI, a national body often referred to as “a sensitive institution”, occasionally kill journalists? As any trained journalist would tell you, we need two sources before we can tell you a story. Here are two stories, with multiple sources and two different endings.

The Guardian

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

There are two things that stand out in this particular case. First, the bizarre sensationalism that has become, it seems, a fundamental part of the style in which the news and talk shows are presented to the public. With an impressive computer animation team working at break neck speed, the news is declared ceremoniously (visual and sound effects included), not reported. Photographs of the injured, the dead, the hospitalised are flashed hundreds of times every hour. News anchors and TV hosts hardly able to contain themselves set the stage for debate and discussion (both on TV and at home) that is low on quality and real content, despite some sane points of view. It is an unsavoury news style, and the public feeds into it.

Second, is the blatant point and blame game. The fact that Mir had pinpointed possible culprits at a time before the shooting actually occurred is worthy of reporting but it amounts to nothing without substantiation. Surely, there must be an epistemology somebody must make the effort of tracing, even under the assumption that Mir had good reason to point a finger at the ISI. To construct a media narrative entirely around this statement- even to present it as a central suspicion- highlights in many ways, the institution’s egotism and self-importance. One leading newspaper has already demanded the resignation of the ISI Chief.

The attack is a horrific example of the state’s state of affairs. The increase in violence has naturally led to a growth in the public’s imagination of violence. There are so many actors up for blame that it is easy to believe any one of them could be responsible. This is especially why the media must focus on responsible, ethical, informative reporting and protect itself from the infiltration of profit-seeking, conspiracy and sensationalism. It must recognise, proudly, that it is based on a principle worth protecting at all costs.

The Nation

Attacks on the media and journalists seem to be intensifying since the start of this year and acquiring a sinister pattern. Earlier attacks on the Express group and particularly its TV anchor Raza Rumi in Lahore, in which he was fortunately relatively unscathed but in which his driver was killed, point to the slate of possible suspects. In Raza Rumi’s case, the gang responsible has recently been rounded up in Lahore and identified as belonging to the Lashkar-e-Jhangvi, a banned extreme sectarian group. However, given the controversy that has arisen as a result of the revelation of Hamid Mir’s allegations against the ISI, the matter assumes even more important dimensions requiring investigations that get to the bottom of the mystery. It may be recalled that some months ago reports spoke of a hit list of the Taliban that included media house owners, prominent journalists and even the unnamed editor of an English newspaper. Since Raza Rumi’s and Hamid Mir’s names were both reportedly on the hit list, it has by now acquired very sinister and important dimensions. Needless to say, the government and all state authorities not only need to cooperate in the investigation into this latest atrocity against a prominent journalist, the authorities and media houses also need to revisit the risks run by working journalists and chalk out security and other safety measures to safeguard those who strive to bring the truth into the light of day, a seemingly noble endeavour, but not without risk to life and limb from variegated enemies, as the track record of journalists killed, attacked and threatened in Pakistan over the years shows.

Daily Times

Mir was on the way from airport to his office when an armed man standing at the corner of a turning road, opened fire on him, latter four unidentified armed men on two motorcycles followed his car and continued to fire from at him.

He received six bullets in the lower part of his body, one bullet in his large intestine two in his left thigh bone, one in hip bone, one bullet crossed from his hand while one crossed after touching his ribs. He is being treated in a private hospital where his condition is stated as stable after surgery.

Amir Mir, brother of Hamid Mir the Popular television anchor stated that Hamid Mir had told his family, employers, government officials and army officials that some officials of Pakistan’s Inter Service Intelligence (ISI), including ISI’s Director General Lt. Gen Zaheerul Islam had prepared a plan to eliminate him.

Pakistan Broadcasters Association (PBA) strongly condemned the attack on Mir and demanded that the attackers be arrested immediately. PBA said repeated attacks and threats to media and journalists are aimed at restricting them from performing their constitutional responsibilities.

Pakistan Federal Union of Journalists (PFUJ), Karachi Union of Journalists (KUJ), Punjab Union of Journalists (PUJ), Rawalpindi/Islamabad Union of Journalists (RIUJ), National press club (NPC), Karachi Press Club (KPC) strongly condemned the attack.

All Pakistan Newspaper Society (APNS) condemned the attack on journalists by “state and non-state actors” and termed it as assault on freedom of press. APNS demanded the government to immediately arrest the perpetrators involved in the attack.

Council of Pakistan Newspaper Editors (CPNE) President Mujeeb-ur-Rehman Shami and General Secretary Dr Jabbar Khattak on April 19 strongly condemned the attack and called it a cowardly act. In a statement they said that it seemed that forces against freedom of media were busy in their wicked designs to crush free media as they were not ready to tolerate dissent. They demanded immediate arrest of the accused and impartial inquiry of the incident.

Condemning the attack, Pakistan Coalition on Media Safety (PCOMS) said it was very troubling that the assailants knowledge of the travel plans of Mir and were able to shot him in broad daylight and make good their escape without being challenged by police or security agencies of federal and provincial governments. PCOMS said the attack on Hamid Mir demonstrated once again government’s callous disregard for the safety of journalists. PCOMS asked the government to inform the people of Pakistan of the steps that had been taken to ensure the safety of a senior journalist who had informed those in authority of the nature of imminent threats that he faced.

In November 2012, explosives were found under the vehicle of Mir in Islamabad when he had gone for some work with his driver and parked his car for a little. The bomb disposal squad was called in to remove the bag after which it was revealed that the bag contained material that was diffused by the squad.

Pakistan Press Foundation