Asian Human Rights Commission: By William Gomes: Freedom of expression is one of the essential pre-requirements for the practice, protection and promotion of democracy. If we are to speak of a democratic Pakistan we need to examine, whether the media is free. Each and every day media professionals are facing threats of kidnapping or murder for telling the truth.
The truth about the life and death of media professionals in Pakistan is a shocking one. According to the New York based media watchdog ‘Committee to Protect Journalist’ (CPJ) from the year 1992 to 2012 42 journalists were killed in Pakistan. Of the reported 42 cases in 96 percent of the cases the perpetrators enjoyed complete impunity. Only in 4 percent of the cases were the perpetrators brought to justice. In murder cases involving the ISI the impunity was 100 percent.
Any civilized person will ask what are the processes and procedure that allowed for this complete impunity. Professor John Finnis has described the rule of law as the “a state of affairs in which legal system is legally in good shape”. If you look into the details of some of the cases of journalist killings you will notice that the promotion of impunity and protection of the perpetrators indicates how bad the legal system is in Pakistan.
The case of Syed Saleem Shahzad exposes the presence of a mounting corporate militarism and an unbalance in the civil–military relations, which has upended the rule of law. The corporate military of Pakistan is engaged in war against the people of Pakistan. Syed Saleem Shahzad was killed by the Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) as a part of that war.
Categories: Asia, Human Rights, Human values, Murder, Pakistan