Media watchdogs to visit Pakistan
PESHAWAR: A fact-finding mission of international media watchdog groups will visit Pakistan next month to discuss the increasing attacks on press freedom in the country, the Pakistan Federal Union of Journalists said on Wednesday. Chris Warren of the International Federation of Journalists will lead the mission, which also includes representatives of the Paris-based Reporters Without Borders, New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists and London-based National Union of Journalists, PFUJ General-Secretary Mazhar Abbas told Daily Times.
“The representatives will visit Pakistan on the PFUJ’s invitation to assess security concerns for the journalists in Pakistan,” he said. Mazhar said the mission would arrive on February 21 and meet government officials, editors, senior journalists, rights activists and victimised reporters and their families in Lahore, Peshawar and possibly Quetta. It will then hold a press conference in Islamabad on February 25 and leave on the same day.
The mission, the first of its kind after high-profile murders, attacks, kidnapping and harassment of journalists in the last few years, will also meet tribal journalists to discuss press freedom in the tribal areas. Mazhar said the mission might meet President Pervez Musharraf, Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz, Federal Information Minister Mohammad Ali Durrani, Pakistan Muslim League Secretary-General Syed Mushahid Hussain and opposition leader in the Senate Raza Rabbani.
Source: Daily Times
Date:1/18/2007
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