Journalists rights group criticizes environment in Pakistan

ISLAMABAD – An international organization that advocates for the rights of journalists has raised questions about conditions that media face in Pakistan ahead of parliamentary elections.

The Committee to Protect Journalists, a New York-based group, says in a new report Saturday it has documented how journalists critical of the military or government authorities were abducted or attacked.

The report also documented how the army’s spokesman has accused journalists of sharing anti-state and anti-military propaganda, and how distribution of two of Pakistan’s largest outlets — Geo TV and Dawn — were arbitrarily restricted.

Aliya Iftikhar, a CPJ researcher who authored the report, quoted several Pakistani journalists who said the judiciary’s silence adds a ‘climate of fear and self-censorship’.

The report says objective reporting has been skewed because of media constraints.