ISLAMABAD: Journalist Saleem Shahzad may have been tortured to death for exposing growing links between the country's intelligence agencies and militants, a leading human rights activist said on Thursday.

Shahzad, who worked for Hong Kong-based Asia Times Online, disappeared from Islamabad on Sunday. His body was found in a canal two days later with what police said were torture marks.

Zohra Yusuf, head of the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan, added to speculation that the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) may have had a hand in the death of Shahzad, a father of three.

“We don't have any conclusive evidence. But the circumstances seem to point to state security agencies because there have been other cases where journalists have been picked up. It's a very disturbing trend,” she told Reuters.

“Perhaps he was being tortured to reveal his sources and his contacts. He could have died in the process.”

Pakistan is the world's most dangerous country for journalists, according to Reporters Without Borders. The ISI rejected suggestions of its involvement in Shahzad's murder and criticised the media for jumping to that conclusion.

Ms Yusuf said she was worried that militants appeared to be gaining ground in various state institutions. “It seems that now every institution has been infiltrated (by militants). It's been a slow process, it's been happening gradually,” she said. “These are very dangerous developments.”

The HRCP chief said human rights activists also had to tread cautiously in Pakistan, where she added extrajudicial killings were on the rise, especially in regions such as Balochistan where security forces were fighting a low-level insurgency.

“In Balochistan itself we lost two of our activists,” she said. “One was picked up last December by security agencies and his body was recovered in April this year. In March again this year another of our activists was shot dead.”

The Human Rights Commission of Pakistan estimates over 1,000 people, mostly political opponents of the government and Baloch nationalists, have gone missing over the last 10 years.

The commission had named dozens of missing people in a Supreme Court petition that holds intelligence agencies responsible for their fate, Ms Yusuf said. “The Supreme Court summoned them. They have appeared a few times and said they don't know. Sometimes they don't appear at all.”—Reuters