Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi on Thursday ordered an inquiry into a raid carried out by Islamabad police at the National Press Club (NPC), where several journalists were allegedly attacked.<\/p>\n
Visuals aired on DawnNewsTV showed policemen armed with batons attacking journalists on the press club premises. Visuals shared on social media also showed police dragging journalists out of what appeared to be the cafeteria.<\/p>\n
Another video shared by a Dawn.com correspondent showed a journalist holding his broken Nikon camera and his shirt ripped across the back.<\/p>\n
A statement issued by Naqvi stated that he had taken notice of the \u201cunfortunate\u201d incident and demanded a report from the Islamabad inspector general of police.<\/p>\n
\u201cViolence against the journalist community cannot be tolerated under any circumstances,\u201d he was quoted as saying. \u201cDisciplinary action must be taken against officials involved in the incident,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, Pakistan Federal Union of Journalists (PFUJ) President Afzal Butt held a press conference alongside Minister of State for Interior Talal Chaudhry at the National Press Club.<\/p>\n
He said that during the police raid, when the press club\u2019s office-bearers tried to intervene and resolve the matter, they were \u201cbeaten and tortured\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey even arrested two people, who were later released,\u201d Butt added.<\/p>\n
He added that multiple people at the scene pointed out that they had to get the police to release them. \u201cToday\u2019s incident is a matter of now or never for us,\u201d Butt said.<\/p>\n
He announced that the PFUJ had called an \u201cemergency session\u201d, where \u201cwe will consult and chalk out our demands about what the government needs to do to prevent what the police did today.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe will also decide our course of action and announce it after the meeting.\u201d<\/p>\n
Butt said, \u201cWe always avoid confrontation with political parties. Our friends were very angry \u2026 but I controlled them \u2026 Something like this has never happened before.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat you enter a photographer\u2019s house \u2014 the press club is their second home [\u2026] that you enter his home without permission, beat him and break his camera and mobile phone. This has never happened before.\u201d<\/p>\n
Butt alleged that even the members of the press club\u2019s management and its office-bearers were \u201cbeaten\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is not only the Islamabad press club\u2019s issue. Press clubs across Pakistan are of the view that if they turn a blind eye to this worst of the worst incident, similar incidents could happen in Lahore, Karachi, Peshawar and Quetta.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat is why we will first consult our friends here and then across Pakistan. We will then decide our plan of action and put forward our demands.\u201d<\/p>\n
For his part, Chaudhry said he condemned the incident and apologised for it. \u201cPlease consider this when you hold your meeting,\u201d he said, assuring that he was also ready to meet them again after their meeting.<\/p>\n
Chaudhry\u2019s office also issued a statement unconditionally apologising for the incident, adding that it happened \u201csuddenly\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cSome people from the [JAAC] were protesting [and] some of their people had manhandled police personnel,\u201d the statement read. \u201cWhen they tried to arrest these people, the police chased them. The police came to the Press Club to arrest the protesters who misbehaved with [officers].\u201d<\/p>\n
The statement added that Chaudhry had ordered an internal inquiry into the incident.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, Information Minister Attaullah Tarar called the incident \u201cregrettable\u201d in a statement, vowing that a comprehensive investigation would be carried out.<\/p>\n
\u201cInterior Minister Naqvi did not order police to enter the press club,\u201d he was quoted as saying. \u201cThe National Press Club is my home and I stand with it,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Journalist bodies held another press conference at the NPC later, where Rawalpindi-Islamabad Union of Journalists President Tariq Virk said journalists across the country stood united after the police raid at NPC.<\/p>\n
He alleged that \u201cIslamabad police personnel had not come to the press club on their own accord but were sent here\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey inflicted violence on journalists inside the press club. They even tortured and arrested an ailing employee of the club,\u201d he alleged, vowing to \u201cadopt such a plan of action\u201d that nobody would resort to this \u201crogue behaviour\u201d in future.<\/p>\n
PFUJ President Butt said today was one of the \u201cdarkest days in Pakistan\u2019s history\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe attack on the National Press Club was an attack on media freedom,\u201d he said, adding that members of journalist bodies had participated in the meeting held after the police raid. \u201cWe will prepare a strategy after consulting all journalist bodies.\u201d<\/p>\n
Butt further stated that journalists in other cities had also protested the raid at NPC and that \u201cif the National Press Club was not safe from police, then no other press club was\u201d. Butt reiterated his allegation that cameras and mobile phones were snatched and broken during the incident.<\/p>\n
He announced that a \u201cblack day\u201d would be observed across the country tomorrow, and black flags would be hoisted at the press clubs all across Pakistan.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe journalists are very angry at the moment. It has been suggested that we get first information reports registered in which some bigwigs are nominated,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Journalist\u2019s account of raid
\nJournalist Shiraz Gardezi, who is associated with Geo News and also the senior joint secretary of the NPC, shared an account of the raid with Dawn.com.<\/p>\n
Gardezi said the Jammu Kashmir Joint Awami Action Committee (JKJAAC) \u2014 which has also been holding demonstrations in Azad Kashmir \u2014 had issued a call for a protest at the press club. \u201cAs soon as the demonstration began, they (police) surrounded the protesters,\u201d he narrated.<\/p>\n
Gardezi, who was at the NPC to cover the protest, said police stopped them from doing so. \u201cBecause they were torturing, beating and dragging people,\u201d he alleged, adding that they even tried to snatch mobile phones and cameras from some of the journalists.<\/p>\n
According to him, they even dragged and tried to take away some of the journalists with them, but they were let go after some other journalists intervened.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe then asked the journalists to stay on the back foot and keep themselves safe,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Later, he continued, \u201cWe heard loud bangs while sitting inside the press club. They (police) kicked the doors open and stormed inside\u201d.<\/p>\n
Shirazi narrated that the police broke various things in the cafeteria and \u201cbeat and tortured\u201d people. This time, too, the police tried to take away some journalists, but they were \u201crescued\u201d.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi on Thursday ordered an inquiry into a raid carried out by Islamabad police at the National Press Club (NPC), where several journalists were allegedly attacked. Visuals aired on DawnNewsTV showed policemen armed with batons attacking journalists on the press club premises. Visuals shared on social media also showed police dragging journalists […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":12402,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12401","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-national-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12401","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=12401"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12401\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12403,"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12401\/revisions\/12403"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/12402"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=12401"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=12401"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=12401"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}