Joint
statement of shared concerns about attacks on journalists in Pakistan
29
May 2014
Dear
Prime Minister
Three
years ago today, journalist Saleem Shahzad was abducted a short distance away
from his Islamabad home and later found dead, his body bearing marks consistent
with torture. We, the representatives of the undersigned group of civil society
organisations working in human rights and media, call on you to fulfil your
promise to end the impunity enjoyed by individuals and groups who threaten,
attack, abduct, torture and kill journalists in Pakistan. In order to address
these attacks on journalists, we urge you to follow through on the commitments
you made in March, and as a first phase country for the UN Action Plan on the
Safety of Journalists and the Issue of Impunity, and to take further concrete
steps along the lines set out below.
Based
on our collective experiences monitoring human rights globally, Pakistan is one
of the most dangerous countries in the world for journalists, judging by the
severity and extent of threats and attacks on media professionals due to their
reporting. Dozens of journalists have been killed in Pakistan in direct
response to their work over the last decade. At least eight journalists have
been killed since your government came to power in June 2013.
Journalists
and other media workers from across Pakistan face harassment, abduction,
torture and attempts on their lives by state intelligence officers, members of
political parties and armed groups like the Taliban. Journalists reporting on
national security and human rights, and those reporting from the
conflict-affected northwest, violence-ravaged Balochistan and the city of
Karachi are most at risk as they rarely enjoy protection from the state or
support from their employers.
We are
deeply concerned at the failure of successive Pakistan governments to carry out
prompt, impartial, independent and thorough investigations into abuses against
journalists, or to bring those responsible to justice. Attempts on the lives of
Hamid Mir and Raza Rumi and the abduction and killing of Saleem Shahzad
exemplify the enduring challenge to justice when journalists come under attack:
as far as our organisations are aware, no one has been brought to justice for
any of these attacks. Only in two cases of journalist killings have the
perpetrators ever been convicted in Pakistan.
The failure to bring those responsible for attacks on
journalists to justice sends a signal that the media can be silenced through
violence and that the perpetrators can literally get away with murder and other
abuses. It also has a chilling effect on freedom of expression in Pakistan,
with journalists increasingly resorting to self-censorship to avoid the risk of
harm.
It is the Pakistan government’s duty under international law to
protect the rights to life, liberty and freedom from torture and other cruel,
inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment of all individuals within its
territory and under its jurisdiction, including journalists. As a state party
to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), Pakistan
must also ensure the media is free to carry out its critical function of
facilitating and promoting freedom of expression, as guaranteed by Article 19
of the ICCPR. Journalists play a vital role in exposing human rights abuse.
Ensuring that journalists are able to undertake their work free from harassment
and abuse is therefore an essential cornerstone in the protection and promotion
of human rights in Pakistan.
We call
on your Government to urgently take the following steps, in line with
Pakistan’s international legal obligations, so that journalists may carry out
their work free from harassment and abuse:�
Re-start
the criminal investigations into the abduction and killing of Saleem Shahzad,
as promised by the current Pakistan government, and ensure that all potential
suspects, including members of any military and intelligence authorities, are
subjected to a full, independent and impartial investigation.
Ensure
prompt, thorough, independent and impartial investigations into human rights
abuses against journalists, including abductions, enforced disappearances,
torture and other ill-treatment, extrajudicial executions and other unlawful
killings.
Ensure
that all persons suspected of crimes involving human rights abuses against
journalists, regardless of their status, rank or affiliation with state or non-state
groups, are brought to justice in fair trials without recourse to the death
penalty.
Implement
the Prime Minister’s announced plan to establish a public prosecutor at the
federal and provincial levels tasked with investigating attacks against journalists,
and ensure that it is independent, adequately staffed and resourced, and has
authority to investigate the military and intelligence services in addition to
civilians. Also implement the Prime Minister’s commitment to expedite the
prosecution of the killers of journalists by changing trial venues and
expanding witness protection programs.
Ensure, in line with the United Nations Plan of Action on the
Safety of Journalists and the Issue of Impunity, that media companies adhere to
requirements on due diligence, health and safety, among other standards in
national law and policy; and introduce systemic legal and policy reforms where
such requirements either do not exist in national law or are inadequate.
We
welcome your concern about the situation for journalists in Pakistan and look
forward to the Pakistan government taking real steps to improve the working
environment for journalists in Pakistan.
Yours
faithfully
Amnesty
International – Salil Shetty,
Secretary General
Article
19 (UK) – Thomas Hughes, Executive
Director
Committee
to Protect Journalists – Joel Simon, Executive
Director
Freedom
House - Karin Karlekar,
Project Director, Freedom of the Press
Human
Rights Watch – Brad Adams, Executive
Director, Asia Division
International
News Safety Institute – Hannah Storm,
Executive Director
Internews – Jeanne Bourgault,
President
Pakistan
Coalition on Media Safety – Owais Aslam Ali, Head
of Secretariat
Pen
International – Ann Harrison,
Programme Director
Reporters
Without Borders - Christopher Deloire,
Secretary-General
� PAGE \* MERGEFORMAT �2� Index: ASA 33/010/2014
No comments:
Post a Comment