Daily Times

The incidents of restrictions on freedom of expression, attacks on media professionals, murders, kidnapping, pressures & tortures and harassment continued whole this year in Pakistan.

According to the Pakistan Press Foundation (PPF) annual review report, 29 incidents of attacks and threats to journalists, including online and offline, happened in Pakistan so far since the inception of the year 2020 whereas 13 cases of the same nature are under investigation.

The PPF 2019 report says that 74 different incidents against journalists were recorded during the year.

It may be noted that the Article 19 of the Constitution provides full freedom of expression to all citizens of Pakistan within the ambit of the law. This was stated at the second day session of a three-day workshop on physical, digital, and psycho social safety training for the bloggers of Sindh and Balochistan and human rights activists, including women, organized by PPF in collaboration with European Union at a local hotel on Saturday.

The workshop apprised the representatives of media and civil society through safety training about safeguarding themselves while using their democratic right. It is the matter of great concern that workers of media and civil society are facing rising cases of physical dangers, online harassment and social & psychological pressures while performing their duties.

According to the latest report of Digital Rights Foundation, Cyber Harassment Helpline received 146 average calls per month in 2019, while 20323 cases were reported out of which 57% were reported by the women.

The safety training workshop was related to procedures to safeguard bloggers and human rights activists to combat physical dangers, secure their personal information on the Internet and tackle psycho and social pressures during danger or trouble situations.

A PPF statement said that it was mandatory to protect people working for the freedom of expression and human rights. The lack of legislation for protection of media in the country is also a matter of concern due to which attacks on the bloggers, journalists and human rights activist have become common while people involved in crimes against media are roaming free.

PPF was striving for boosting freedom of expression. PPF’s this kind of workshop is the third pertaining to safety training. Twenty more workshops will be organized in collaboration with European Union and in association with Civil Society for Independent Media and Expression, Media Matters for Democracy, and Centre for Peace and Development Initiative in Lahore, Karachi and Islamabad.