CPJ News Alert 2008

	Pakistan expels reporter for The New York Times New York, January 11, 2008—The Committee to Protect Journalists is disturbed by Pakistan’s deportation today of Nicholas Schmidle, a journalist whose report “Next-Gen Taliban” appeared in The New York Times Magazine on January 6. The article contained interviews with anti-government Taliban leaders and was written from the tumultuous Baluchistan province, and its capital, Quetta. CPJ was unable to immediately reach officials from the Pakistani Embassy in Washington and the U.N. mission in New York for comment. According to Scott Malcomson, his editor at the magazine, Schmidle was given no explanation for his deportation by officials from the Ministry of the Interior. Malcomson told CPJ, however, that the deportation “clearly was connected to his writing rather than anything else he was doing.” “CPJ is unfortunately accustomed to reporting on the government’s attacks on the local media, but now harassment seems to be spreading to foreign journalists as well,” said Joel Simon, CPJ’s executive director. “At a time of growing crisis in Pakistan, perhaps the worst tactic for promoting calm is for the government to silence the press.” Security services members visited Schmidle on Monday, and the local police gave him a deportation order on Tuesday, according to Malcomson. While the deportation order was dated December 29, 2007, editors at the magazine say they believe it was back-dated, and that officials issued it after the magazine’s article ran. The reporter, who is also a fellow at the Washington-based Institute of Current World Affairs, regularly freelances for The New Republic and Slate. He had been in the country 23 months, Malcomson said. Schmidle told CPJ from London on Friday that he was “extremely disappointed at being asked to leave Pakistan,” and that his visa had contained “no restrictions whatsoever.” “I have yet to hear the Pakistani side in this, but if this is a sign that journalists will be subject to reprisals for reporting honestly on conditions in Pakistan, that is a cause for serious concern,” Gerald Marzorati, editor of The New York Times Magazine, told CPJ. In addition to visiting journalists reporting more difficulty in obtaining visas to enter Pakistan and traveling to conflict regions, there have been two serious incidents of government harassment of foreign journalists in the past 13 months: On December 19, 2006, New York Times reporter Carlotta Gall was physically assaulted and her belongings, including computers, notebooks, and mobile phones, were seized by four men who said they were from the Special Branch in Quetta. Her photographer, Akhtar Soomro, was detained at the same time. On November 11, 2007, two Daily Telegraph reporters, Isambard Wilkinson, Colin Freeman, and a reporter for the Sunday Telegraph, Damien McElroy, were ordered to leave the country within 72 hours, after an editorial critical of President Pervez Musharraf appeared in the British paper. Musharraf declared a state of emergency on November 3, severely curtailing media freedoms in the country. Despite the lifting of the state of emergency on December 15, many of these freedoms have not yet been restored.

Pakistan expels reporter for The New York Times

New York, January 11, 2008—The Committee to Protect Journalists is disturbed by Pakistan’s deportation today of Nicholas Schmidle, a journalist whose report “Next-Gen Taliban” appeared in The New York Times Magazine on January 6. The article contained interviews with anti-government Taliban leaders and was written from the tumultuous Baluchistan province, and its capital, Quetta. CPJ was unable to immediately reach officials from the Pakistani Embassy in Washington and the U.N. mission in New York for comment.

According to Scott Malcomson, his editor at the magazine, Schmidle was given no explanation for his deportation by officials from the Ministry of the Interior. Malcomson told CPJ, however, that the deportation “clearly was connected to his writing rather than anything else he was doing.”

“CPJ is unfortunately accustomed to reporting on the government’s attacks on the local media, but now harassment seems to be spreading to foreign journalists as well,” said Joel Simon, CPJ’s executive director. “At a time of growing crisis in Pakistan, perhaps the worst tactic for promoting calm is for the government to silence the press.”

Security services members visited Schmidle on Monday, and the local police gave him a deportation order on Tuesday, according to Malcomson. While the deportation order was dated December 29, 2007, editors at the magazine say they believe it was back-dated, and that officials issued it after the magazine’s article ran. The reporter, who is also a fellow at the Washington-based Institute of Current World Affairs, regularly freelances for The New Republic and Slate. He had been in the country 23 months, Malcomson said.

Schmidle told CPJ from London on Friday that he was “extremely disappointed at being asked to leave Pakistan,” and that his visa had contained “no restrictions whatsoever.”

“I have yet to hear the Pakistani side in this, but if this is a sign that journalists will be subject to reprisals for reporting honestly on conditions in Pakistan, that is a cause for serious concern,” Gerald Marzorati, editor of The New York Times Magazine, told CPJ.

In addition to visiting journalists reporting more difficulty in obtaining visas to enter Pakistan and traveling to conflict regions, there have been two serious incidents of government harassment of foreign journalists in the past 13 months:

On December 19, 2006, New York Times reporter Carlotta Gall was physically assaulted and her belongings, including computers, notebooks, and mobile phones, were seized by four men who said they were from the Special Branch in Quetta. Her photographer, Akhtar Soomro, was detained at the same time.

On November 11, 2007, two Daily Telegraph reporters, Isambard Wilkinson, Colin Freeman, and a reporter for the Sunday Telegraph, Damien McElroy, were ordered to leave the country within 72 hours, after an editorial critical of President Pervez Musharraf appeared in the British paper.

Musharraf declared a state of emergency on November 3, severely curtailing media freedoms in the country. Despite the lifting of the state of emergency on December 15, many of these freedoms have not yet been restored.