Showing dismay over the findings of a report by the Saleem Shahzad Commission, members of Media Commission Pakistan (MCP) and South Asian Free Media Association (SAFMA) on Monday recommended parliamentary oversight on intelligence agencies’ role, appointment of a minister and ombudsman to monitor their role and legislation on agencies’ working. In an interactive session held by MCP and SAFMA at the latter’s office, SAFMA Secretary General Imtiaz Alam, MCP President M Ziauddin, NPC President Farooq Faisal and veteran journalist Afzal Khan, while reviewing the judicial inquiry report of Saleem Shahzad, stressed the need for creating an ombudsman and urged the journalists to adhere to a Code of Conduct, which should include a direction that there should be no interaction between media persons and the agencies.
The participants also urged the parliamentarians and media organisations to play an active role to highlight the issue, saying the agencies’ role must be monitored by a minister or ombudsman, and the government should introduce a law to supervise the secret services to stop the killing of journalists.
Imtiaz Alam said though the commission’s report had identified the culprits but no tangible steps were taken to arrest the cruel hands behind the murder of Saleem Shahzad, a prominent journalist who was abducted in broad daylight from the heart of the capital on May 29, 2011 and later killed.
Alam said the Commission had not fully investigated the policies and practices of the ISI and other intelligence agencies and now parliamentarians must introduce a bill to monitor the role of agencies.
Ziauddin, while showing reservations on the report, said the parliamentarians and media organisations must devise a strategy. He called for a thorough introspection at all levels of Pakistani society and the state. Ziauddin suggested that the police should investigate this case and catch the culprits.
Afzal Khan and Farooq Faisal stressed the need for “credible and transparent system” for addressing the journalists’ grievances against the intelligence agencies. They also said the commission had not followed “the mandate, the legal framework and the accountability system under which the ISI operates.” They discussed the stumbling blocks for those investigating crimes, where the perpetrators are non-state militant groups or state actors.
The participants said the failure of this probe to identify the culprits did raise a big question about the justice system’s ability to resolve such ‘mysterious’ incidents even in the future. “Whoever is responsible for Shahzad’s barbaric murder, one thing is for sure – he will not be the last journalist to have sacrificed his life for uncovering the truth, as there are many more newsmen in Pakistan who firmly believe that the ‘truth’ remains superior to the so-called ‘national interest’,” they maintained.
They added that the commission only managed to recover emails from the laptop and questioned the unavailability of other data. “The report only made observations that already existed and there was nothing new that surfaced in the probe,” the participants said.
The high-level judicial commission, headed by Supreme Court Justice Saqib Nisar, was formed to probe the killing in June, 2011.
“The commission looked very hard for the kind of substantial evidence/tangible material – direct or circumstantial – which would allow it to single out the culprits from the various suspected quarters. Yet such evidence has not surfaced,” the report stated. It went on to state, however, that, “Nonetheless, the commission urges the government to provide substantial compensation and support to the family of the deceased.”
