His Excellency Gen. Pervez Musharraf
Chief Executive
General Headquarters Pakistani Army
Rawalpindi
Pakistan
Via Fax: + 92 51 922 4206
Vienna, 29 September 2000
Your Excellency,
The International Press Institute (IPI), the global network of editors and media executives, is deeply concerned at the methods employed by an army inspection team at the headquarters of the Dawn Group of newspapers at Haroon House, Karachi.
According to IPI’s sources, on 27 September, a monitoring team consisting of six armed personnel from the Air Defense Division, accompanied by three engineers of the Karachi Electric Supply Corporation (KESC) and a representative of the Electric Inspector arrived at the Dawn Group offices. The monitoring group had provided no prior notice to the Dawn Group and insisted on an immediate inspection and testing of “all the existing electric installations”. The monitoring team threatened to disconnect the building’s electric supply if they were not given instant access, which would have put a stop to all printing activities.
In addition, the military personnel refused to disband of their weapons when asked to do so in accordance with Dawn’s security regulations, put in place after a bomb detonation at its headquarters last year. Furthermore, the officer in charge warned photographers not to take pictures of the inspection saying that “this was a secret operation ordered by the higher ups” and that “no photographs were to be published in the Dawn Group of Newspapers”. After four hours of searching different offices in the building, the monitoring group failed to find any evidence of the alleged 18 accounts of billing discrepancies by the Dawn Group that were presented as the reason for the inspection. A spokesman for the KESC said that the inspection was “in line with the overall policy of combing various industries in the city, including newspapers”. In addition, he said that the soldiers not parting with their weapons was “in line with their duty and training “.
Prior to the inspection, editor and publishers of the Dawn Group had received warnings that the authorities were preparing for something “significant”. In addition, the government had strongly protested a 12 September article in the newspaper Dawn by senior correspondent Shaheen Sehbai, who speculated that the authorities were preparing to initiate a round of repressive measures against the press. The Minister of Information sent a letter to Dawn in response to the article, threatening with legal action if the newspaper did not print a clarification.
IPI believes that the use of armed personnel in this matter is far beyond what constitutes reasonable necessity, especially when put in context with the statement by the Dawn Group that is has never defaulted on payments. In addition, the threatening manner employed by the monitoring group appears to be an attempt to harass and intimidate employees of the Dawn Group, the largest independent English language newspaper and magazine publishing house in Pakistan.
Therefore, IPI urges Your Excellency to ensure that a proper investigation into this matter is undertaken so that incidents like this can be prevented in the future. In addition, we urge Your Excellency to ensure that all newspapers in Pakistan are allowed to voice their opinions, regardless of political conviction. The principle of accountability, which can only be secured by the existence of a free press, is of particular importance with regards to the current political situation in Pakistan.
We thank you for your attention.
Yours sincerely,
Johann P. Fritz
Director
cc: Mr. Javed Jabbar Minister for Information and Broadcasting, Government of Pakistan. + 9252 920 2961
