free media | Pakistan Press Foundation (PPF)

Pakistan Press Foundation

Journalists In Danger

Pakistan Press Foundation

According to research by Pakistan Press Foundation (PPF), since 2001, 71 journalists and media workers have lost their lives doing their duties. Of these, 47 have been deliberately targeted and murdered for practicing their profession, while others were killed while covering dangerous assignments. The report pinpoints eight sources of threat to the journalists: militants, political […]


‘No law allows blocking of websites’

Pakistan Press Foundation

ISLAMABAD: There is currently no law that allows the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) to ban websites, even pornographic ones, and the actions of the Inter-Ministerial Committee for the Evaluation of Websites (IMCEW) are completely unconstitutional, a lawyer who has been fighting a legal battle for the restoration of popular video-sharing website YouTube, said on Tuesday. […]


LG system, free media vital for democracy

Pakistan Press Foundation

ISLAMABAD: Academics, media practitioners and rights activists at a conference have said that democracy was essential for safeguarding peoples’ rights and stability of the country. They also said that independent media, decentralisation of power and local governments were imperative to cater to the needs of a diverse group of people. They were speaking at the […]


UN Secretary General must recognise the ‘Right to Know’ in his Post-2015 report

Pakistan Press Foundation

His Excellency Ban Ki-moon Secretary General of the United Nations United Nations Headquarters New York, NY 10017 CC: Amina J. Mohammed, Assistant Secretary General Dear Mr. Secretary General, We write to you as a coalition of civil society organisations committed to sustainable development, to urge you to highlight the importance of the right to information, […]


Ruling the airwaves

Pakistan Press Foundation

A few days ago, the BBC Urdu website carried an interesting news report that gave details of the number of exclusive interviews of various front-line politicians carried by Pakistan’s 24/7 private news channels over nearly a 10-month period – prior to the August 14 ‘revolutionary’ and ‘freedom’ marches and sit-ins by PTI and the PAT […]


The limits of freedom

Pakistan Press Foundation

It has been said that democracy is the worst form of government except all others that have been tried — Winston Churchill. I feel the same about the market economy. But when the two function side by side, the combination becomes too deadly for even the most modern and the most sophisticated societies. Corruption becomes […]


N working for free media: Pervez

Pakistan Press Foundation

ISLAMABAD: Federal Minister for Information and Broadcasting, Pervez Rashid has said that PML-N, has been working for freedom of the media as vibrant media was in the best interest of the country. Talking to a private TV channel, he stated that the government had abolished the secret funds. Replying to a question, he observed that […]


Media heading for Berlusconization?

Pakistan Press Foundation

Angelika W. Wyka describes the rise of Berlusconization in European polity in Kakanien.com as, “the godfather of Berlusconization is former Italian Prime Minister and media magnate Silvio Berlusconi. For Berlusconi, ownership of media outlets was clearly of great political value. “In the beginning of the 1990s, commercial television helped him move to political power (Berlusconi’s […]