KARACHI, July 25: The Pakistan Federal Union of Journalists (PFUJ) has strongly condemned the illegal detention of a senior reporter of The Star, Rasheed Channa, by police and intelligence agencies allegedly on orders from the chief minister’s house, and urged the Chief Justice of Pakistan to take suo motu action against those responsible.

Mr Channa said that it was a few hours before he was taken to Shahra-e-Faisal police station. In the intervening period, he said, security officials in plainclothes “advised” him not to write against Chief Minister Arbab Ghulam Rahim. In a statement on Monday, the PFUJ said the manner in which Mr Channa was detained and threatened was a grave source of torture and anguish for both the reporter and members of his family.

The PFUJ said it believed that the government had once again adopted an illegal course to ‘fix’ journalists, noting that six cases were already pending against three newspapers and two reporters. The incident concerning The Star reporter came just days after the government arrested a chief editor, editor, assistant editor and three newspaper employees of a daily and two weeklies.

The most condemnable part, the statement said, was that all the jailed journalists had been given ‘C’ class in the Central Prison, Karachi, and were being treated as hardened criminals. Despite demands, the government and police had not yet come out with details about specific charges against them. The PFUJ also took note of a report that a journalist’s house was bombed in the Gilgit area, and urged the government to provide details about the incident.

PROTEST RALLY: In Peshawar, the Khyber Union of Journalists (KhUJ) strongly condemned the arrest of Mr Channa from his house in Karachi.