Prime Minister urged to investigate shooting attack, threats, censorship

Reporters Without Borders calls on Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani to assign sufficient resources to the investigation into a shooting attack on a well-known journalist’s home to ensure that those responsible are identified. The Rawalpindi home of Kamran Shafi, a leading columnist with the newspaper Dawn, was shot up on the night of 27 November. “I want to know who attacked my home,” Shafi told Reporters Without Borders. “I am not pointing my finger at anyone. This shooting was traumatic for me and my family but it will not make me stop writing.” The police have announced the arrests of two possible accomplices and have given Shafi protection. Reporters Without Borders also wants Prime Minister Gilani to provide an explanation for the threats that one of his ministers made against a reporter with a leading Karachi-based business newspaper and for the pressure that his government and the government of Dubai have put on Geo TV – a Pakistani station that broadcasts from Dubai – to get a talk-show banned. “When journalists who criticise the authorities are targeted, whether by gunshots or censorship attempts, it is a democratic government’s duty to guarantee their safety,” Reporters Without Borders said. “We urge the prime minister to do what is necessary to ensure that the investigations into these incidents are effective and to publicly say that press freedom applies to those who criticise the president and armed forces.” Reporters Without Borders added: “The progress that has been made in terms of press freedom must not be tarnished by this kind of incident.” A total of six shots were fired at Shafi’s home on the night of 27 November by an unidentified gunman who collected the spent bullet casings before leaving. The shots penetrated one of the rooms but Shafi and his family were unhurt because they were in a lower room. A former army officer who is nowadays a TV commentator as well as newspaper columnist, Shafi received a threatening phone call the day after the shooting. A woman’s voice told him that what had happened was just the “trailer” and that he would soon be shown “the entire film.” The police have arrested two employees of a public telephone store from where the call was made. They said it was made by a veiled woman. The columns that Shafi writes for Dawn have criticised abuses by Pakistan’s intelligence agencies, which operate outside of any government control, he says. Read one of his articles: http://www.dawn.com/wps/wcm/connect/dawn-content-library/dawn/the-newspaper/columnists/kamran-shafi-in-it-up-to-our-necks-129 Meanwhile, Mushtaq Ghumman of Karachi’s leading business newspaper Business Recorder has received phone calls from aides of federal industry minister Mian Manzoor Wattoo threatening him with reprisals if he does not stop writing articles about corruption cases in which the minister is allegedly involved. Ghumman told Reporters Without Borders: “One of the minister’s protocol officials told me I would be taught a lesson if I did not change my behaviour.” Ghumman, who had asked the minister about a corruption case at a news conference, has not filed a complaint. Reporters Without Borders also condemns the attempts by officials in Islamabad and Dubai to obtain the cancellation Meray Mutabiq, a Geo TV talk show that is broadcast from Dubai. Hosted by Dr. Shahid Masood, the popular show is often very critical of President Asif Ali Zardari. As a result of pressure by the authorities of the United Arab Emirates, Geo TV was forced to broadcast the show from an undisclosed studio on 23 November. The daily newspaper The News quoted Masood as saying he had received death threats from Zardari supporters. Geo TV has described the episode as a recurrence of the kind of press freedom violation that took place under former President Pervez Musharraf.