ISLAMABAD: Pakistan’s first-ever Media Impunity Index, which evaluates progress in combating impunity in crimes against journalists at the federal and provincial levels, was unveiled on Thursday as stakeholders expressed concern over multiple targeted killings of journalists and media practitioners in 2024.

Launched by Freedom Network at an event held in connection with International Day to End Impunity (IDEI), which falls on Nov 2, the index measures various aspects, such as policy initiatives, legislative actions and the establishment of protective mechanisms for journalists.

“While the federal and Sindh governments have made significant progress in passing safety laws for journalists, a critical shortcoming remains: the legislations have failed to establish the functioning safety commissions necessary to implement the laws,” a press release said.

The Index puts Sindh government on top with nine points out of 10 on progress while the federal government eight points. Balochistan and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa score just two points each for managing to produce draft laws on journalists’ safety and basic consultations among stakeholders. Punjab scores just one point — the lowest ranking among the provinces.

Freedom Network reports six cases of targeted killings, 57 ‘violations’ in 2024

According to the report, there were several instances during 2024 when various courts — including district courts, high courts and the apex court — came to the rescue of journalists charged under various offences, often by state actors, serving as a silver lining over dark clouds that hand over journalists and other media practitioners.

Dangerous year

The year 2024 proved to no different for journalists, as it witnessed six casualties of media practitioners, including a YouTuber, and 57 violations recorded, with provinces doing little to end impunity for crimes against media and its practitioners, according to Freedom Network’s Impunity Report 2024.

The report notes that the federal and Sindh provincial laws have not been able to protect journalists and revealed alarming statistics — 11 assassination attempts, including five murders of journalists and a digital media practitioner, that occurred between November 2023 and August 2024.

At least 57 violations, including threats, assaults, and legal harassment, were also recorded during the reporting period.

“Despite the enactment of Sindh Protection of Journalists and Other Media Practitioners Bill, 2021, and the federal Protection of Journalist and Media Professional Act, 2021, both the federal and Sindh governments have failed to enforce these laws, leaving journalists vulnerable without any use of the legal framework protections,” Freedom Network Executive Director Iqbal Khattak said while launching the report.

“The lack of political will and resources to enforce special laws for protection of journalists is keeping the situation dangerous for journalists in Pakistan,” he said.

According to the report, in the year under review, Sindh was on top of the list where most violations were recorded (37pc or 21 out of 57 cases including three murders) followed by Punjab where 23pc violations (13 cases) were recorded.

Islamabad was the third most dangerous area for journalists in the year with 21pc violations (12 cases). Khyber Pakhtunkhwa was fourth with 12pc (seven cases including murders of two tribal journalists) while Balochistan recorded 3.5pc violations (two cases).

TV journalists faced the brunt of these cases — 30 in total which amount to 53pc followed by print media with 35pc cases while digital journalists 10pc and radio journalists 2pc faced different kinds of threats during the reporting period.

Women made up nine per cent of the journalists who faced such threats.

The report also identified threat actors allegedly involved in these cases. These included government authorities (47pc) followed by political parties (12pc) and miscellaneous identified actors (16pc). Unknown actors stood at 25pc.

Published in Dawn, November 1st, 2024