Daily Times

Federal Minister for Information, Broadcasting, National Heritage and Culture Attaullah Tarar on Tuesday said that stern action would taken against elements involved in digital terrorism to harass and target journalists through social media.

“Attempts are being made to harm the children of journalists by sharing their families’ details and their addresses,” the minister said while addressing a press conference on Tuesday.

The minister stated in categorical terms that the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting with the collaboration of the Ministry of Interior will take stern action against those involved in a campaign against the journalists.

He said that the objective of the malicious campaign was to harm journalists and their families and Pakistan Federal Union of Journalists (PFUJ) had also strongly condemned online harassment of journalists. Threatening and targeting the journalists and their families was a highly condemnable act and not a single culprit would be spared, the minister assured.

Castigating the PTI leadership, he said that they ran away from D Chowk leaving their party workers. He said that the question arises as to why the PTI leaders escaped from the Blue Area.

Attaullah Tarar said that the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government and some of its ministers had opposed the call for civil disobedience and this was a step worth appreciation. “For the first time someone in the PTI has preferred national interest over the party and personnel interest”, he said.

He said that the PTI leadership had sown the seeds of hatred and disunity in the nation and now they were reaping the same harvest as the PTI was facing infighting and disharmony among its ranks. Blasting the PTI, he said that the group has called for boycotting Pakistani products as they were propagating and projecting foreign agenda against the national institutions.

Taking a dig at the PTI, he said they call for the boycott of Pakistani products but they open their mouths on the genocide of Palestinians. Elaborating further, he said that when all-parties conference was held on the Palestine issue, the PTI did not attend as they could not condemn the Israeli aggression.

He opined that the Goldsmith family had directed the PTI not to take part in any campaign in favour of Palestine. “The PTI is pursuing a foreign agenda against Pakistan and its forces. Those creating a rift between the army and the people want to weaken the country”, he added.

He said it was a known principle if the army of a country was strong, the country was strong but if the army was weak, the country was weak.

He said the entire world acknowledged that the Pakistani Army was a most efficient and professional entity. The minister was of the opinion that the PTI wanted to weaken the army so that inimical forces could take advantage.

“The whole world knows about ‘Operation Goldsmith”, he said adding that late Hakeem Saeed and Dr Israr Ahmed had rightly predicted the agenda of the founder of the PTI.

“They want chaos in the country and on May 9 and November 26, they wanted to spread anarchy in the country but they could not escape punishment”, the minister remarked.