Pakistan’s Ruling Party storm press club beat up journalists
PESHAWAR, June 30 2006: Activists of Pakistan’s ruling Muslim League (PML-Q) stormed the Peshawar Press Club on June 29, 2006 to foil a news conference there by some dissident leaders of the party. The intruders, who were armed with Kalashnikovs, pistols and sticks, beat up journalists and the dissident party members.
The press club was attacked as PML-Q’s dissident bloc president Haji Ulas Khan and Zikria Khan and Ihsanullah were to hold a press conference. When journalists asked the intruders to leave the club premises they and dissident party members were beaten up. A police team which reached the place after the attack and arrested six intruders.
The management of the club lodged a complaint against provincial PML-Q president and federal minister Amir Muqam, provincial information secretary of the party Nighat Orakzai and heads of the party’s youth, labour and students wings for the attack. The Peshawar Press Club announced a boycott of PML-Q functions and their press releases and decided to cancel the membership of any club member covering a PML-Q event.
Members of the club and the Khyber Union of Journalists announced that they would not negotiate with any PML-Q leader until those named in the criminal complaint were arrested. They held a protest walk to the Chief the Minister’s Secretariat and staged a sit-in.
Source: Dawn
Date:6/30/2006
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