The South Asian Free Media Association (Safma) in its National Executive Body meeting held here on Sunday has condemned the continuing rise in violence against working journalists in the country over the past few months.
The Safma has observed a serious deterioration in the security environment for journalists, who are being murdered and threatened to be killed. The Safma National Executive Body took stock of aggravating situation for working journalists and expressed fear for the safety of two-media persons Munir Mengal of the TV station Baloch Voice and Mehruddin Marri of a Sindhi-language daily newspaper, who are still missing after being kidnapped by intelligence agencies.
The Safma demanded of the Sindh government and the concerned agencies to take all the possible steps to ensure safety and early recovery of both journalists while appealing to the superior court to take suo motu notice of these habeas corpus-cases.
The meeting expressed a sigh of relief over the release of Saeed Sarbazi of Business Recorder, termed his abduction and threats to his life as most unfortunate steps.
The Safma NEB meeting conveyed deep sorrow and sense of loss at the death of three journalists -Hayatullah Khan of Urdu-language daily Ausaf and photographer for the European Press Photo Agency (EPA), Munir Ahmad Sangi of Channel KTN and Maqbool Hussain Siyal of the Online news agency.
Realising the lack of fair investigation into the cases of Hayatullah Khan, the Safma demanded to make the two reports of the investigation public. To eliminate the possibility of impunity, it demanded of the government to bring the real culprits to justice in murder cases of journalists to alleviate the apprehensions of journalist community.
The Safma rapped the law enforcement agencies and police of un-provoked beating of three TV journalists from ATV and ARY and termed it as a blatant attack on press freedom. The Safma expressed its anguish over the Punjab government's illegal action to forcefully restrain local cable operators from transmitting ARY One transmission in the province.
The meeting averred that incident of thrashing of senior journalist like CR Shamsi at the premises of Parliament House by a bodyguard of law minister and numerous kidnappings and threats to lives of journalists speak volumes about how far the government high ups respect journalists.
The meeting expressed solidarity with journalists' who stood firm in their flight for press freedom and called upon the government to respect fundamental rights guaranteed under the Constitution, press freedom in particular.
The meeting also expressed its utter disappointment over not providing land for South Asian Media University that President Musharraf and the Punjab chief minister had promised.
The Safma body vowed to pursue its agenda for peace, regional co-operation, press freedom and journalists' rights regardless of any pressure from any quarter, how powerful it might be, and despite various hindrances.
It called upon the governments of Pakistan and India to control the menace of terrorism. While promoting all possible co-operation in all possible areas, the Safma emphasised, the two governments must not waste time in moving towards conflict resolution, including on Kashmir.
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