H.E Asif Ali Zardari
President
Office of the President
Awan-E-Sadar
Constitution Avenue
Islamabad
Islamic Republic of Pakistan
Fax: (011.92.51.2) 920.3938
Your Excellency:
As members of the Overseas Press Club of America, we have spent a great deal of our professional lives reporting on violent events all over the world. However, few such events have shocked us as much as the killing in August, in Pakistan’s Khyber Pass, of an Afghan journalist known for his critical reporting on the Taliban. It appears that he was singled out for assassination because he was too well informed about the activities of Taliban militants and Pakistani intelligence agencies.
Janullah Hashimzada, who was bureau chief in Peshawar, Pakistan for Afghanistan’s Shamshad Television, was traveling from the Afghan border of Torkham to Peshawar in a minibus when the vehicle was intercepted by masked assailants who forced the minibus to a stop and fired at Hashimzada with assault rifles, shooting him at least six times. Another employee of the station was seriously injured in the attack. Hashimzada was dead on arrival at a regional hospital and the other man was placed under medical care.
The president of the Peshawar Press Club, Shamim Shahid, stated: “This was purely a targeted killing.
He was very critical of the Taliban and some of his reporting was unacceptable both to the Pakistani and the Afghan governments and their intelligence agencies.” The Press Club president continued: “He had too much information regarding the militants, the Taliban and the intelligence agencies.”
According to the International Press Institute (IPI), Hashimzada had been receiving threatening phone calls and was being followed. The IPI’s Death Watch list includes eleven journalists killed in Pakistan in the last year, six of them in the highly volatile northwest region of the country, where Hashimzada was murdered.
Your Excellency, it must be obvious that, as professional journalists, we are appalled by these events.
It would be reassuring to know that the government of Pakistan, at the very least, is investigating this crime with a view to bringing the perpetrators to justice.
We hope we can count on you to take action in this matter. Of course, we would appreciate a reply to our letter.
Respectfully yours,
George Bookman
Norman A. Schorr
Freedom of the Press Committee
cc:
H E. Hussain Haqqani
Ambassador of Pakistan to the U.S.A.
Embassy of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan
3517 International Court, NW
Washington, DC 20008
Ambassador Abdullah Hussain Haroon
Permanent Representative
Permanent Mission of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan to the United Nations
8 East 65th Street
New York, NY 10021
Fax: (212) 744.7348
H.E. Anne W. Patterson
U.S. Ambassador to Pakistan
Embassy of the United States of America
Diplomatic Enclave, Ramna 5
Islamabad
Pakistan
Fax: (011.92.51) 227.6427
Mr. Abbas Nasir
Editor-in-Chief
Dawn TV
Haroon House, Dr. Ziauddin Ahmed Road
Karachi 74200
Pakistan
Fax: (011.92.21) 569.3995
webmaster@dawn.com
Rana Qaisar
Islamabad Resident Editor
Daily Times
Aquhbar Market, Moti Plaza
Murree Road
Rawalpindi
Pakistan
(ranakaisar@hotmail.com)
M.A.Zubari
Editor-in-chief
Business Recorder
Recorder House
531 Business Recorder Road
Karachi 74550
Pakistan
(edkhi@br-mail.com)