Pakistani journalists protest press crackdown after latest attack
Thousands of journalists in Pakistan on Friday staged a protest across the country against a crackdown on press freedom following the latest attack on a colleague.
Human rights activists, lawyers, and students also joined journalists in protests in front of press clubs in all major cities and towns.
The Pakistan Federal Union of Journalists (PFUJ), an umbrella organization for several media workers’ bodies, called for protests after journalist Asad Ali Toor was attacked on Tuesday.
At least three masked men armed with guns stormed Toor’s apartment, gagged and tied him up, and tortured him.
The attack was the latest in a series of assaults against journalists critical of the military since the government of Prime Minister Imran Khan took over in the 2018 elections tainted by army interference.
In April, a gunman shot and wounded another journalist outside his house in Islamabad.
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“We are under attack,’’ PFUJ secretary-general Nasir Zaidi said at the protest in the southern city of Karachi’’, but we will not bow down to such tactics.”
Amnesty International, the Committee to Protect Journalists and several other global bodies have called on Pakistan’s government to end impunity for crimes against media employees.
Several journalists have been murdered, kidnapped, tortured, and intimidated in Pakistan in recent years, but perpetrators were not punished in a single case.
