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Journalist in Pakistan charged with
sedition
After authorities denied
holding freelance journalist Khawar Mehdi Rizvi for
weeks, Pakistan police at the weekend formally charged
him with sedition, conspiracy and impersonation, senior
police officials have told Agence France-Presse (AFP).
The maximum penalty for the charges is life
imprisonment.
Two other people were also charged
with Rizvi, Allah Noor and Abdullah Shakir. Police
accuse them of fabricating video footage of Taliban
activity in Pakistan and trying to "defame the country",
according to an AFP interview with Shoaib Suddle, the
police chief of southwestern Balochistan province. The
three are currently being held in police custody in the
southwestern city of Quetta.
The charges stem
from Rizvi's work as a fixer for two French journalists,
Marc Epstein and Jean-Paul Guilloteau, from the news
weekly L'Express, in December 2003. Rizvi and the French
journalists went to Quetta to research a story about
Taliban activity along the Pakistan-Afghani border, from
December 9 through December 14, even though Epstein and
Guilloteau only had visas to travel to Karachi, Lahore
and Islamabad.
When the three journalists
returned to Karachi, officers from the Federal
Investigation Agency arrested Epstein and Guilloteau,
and charged them with visa violations under Pakistan's
Foreigners Act for traveling to Quetta without
permission. Rizvi was also detained, but police
officially denied holding him until January 24. The
French journalists appealed a guilty verdict in their
case and were allowed to return to France on January 12.
Rizvi will be allowed to appear in court within
seven days of being charged, according to local
journalists, when a regional district judge in Quetta
will hear the police's charges against him and the two
other individuals and decide whether they will be
formally indicted.
Authorities allege that Rizvi
intentionally hired Noor and Shakir to impersonate
members of the Taliban in video footage made by the
French journalists. Footage of Noor and Shakir has been
shown on state television PTV. As Rizvi has been held in
secret detention by security agencies since December 16,
his version of the events is unknown. Epstein and
Guilloteau have said that the footage is accurate, and
that Rizvi did not hire Noor and Shakir to impersonate
members of the Taliban.
Rizvi is charged with
violating the sedition law under Pakistan's Penal Code,
section 124-A, which is defined as using speech that
"brings or attempts to bring into hatred or contempt, or
excites or attempts to excite disaffection towards, the
Central or Provincial Government established by law".
"We are outraged by the treatment of our
colleague Khawar Mehdi Rizvi, and by the charges brought
against him," said Ann Cooper, executive director of the
Committee to Protect Journalists. "We urge the
government to give Rizvi the full access to legal
representation that he is entitled to under the law."
The US-based Human Rights Watch has urged
Pakistani President General Pervez Musharraf to order
the immediate release of Rizvi.
(Committee to
Protect Journalists)
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