CPJ demands Pakistan restore Ahmad Noorani's YouTube channel, end harassment of journalists

 JournalismPakistan.com |  Published 6 months ago |  CPJ News Alert

NEW YORK—Pakistani authorities must immediately restore access to exiled investigative journalist Ahmad Noorani’s YouTube channel in Pakistan and stop law enforcement agencies from harassing him and his family, the Committee to Protect Journalists said.

“Blocking journalist Ahmad Noorani’s YouTube channel and filing a criminal case against him is indicative of Pakistan’s relentless campaign against exiled journalists,” said Beh Lih Yi, CPJ’s Asia program coordinator. “It also appears that the journalist’s family is being targeted back home in Pakistan. The brutal intimidation of journalists and their families must stop, and the Pakistan government must allow the media to report freely.”

On May 12, YouTube told Noorani that it had blocked his channel, with 173,000 followers, in Pakistan based on a legal complaint from the government, according to the journalist and a copy of YouTube’s email, reviewed by CPJ.

On May 13, Pakistan’s National Cyber Crime Investigation Agency opened an investigation into Noorani, accusing him of running hate campaigns against the armed forces, under the controversial Prevention of Electronic Crimes Act, for which he could face up to three years imprisonment.

The investigators cited two of Noorani’s posts on the social media platform X that criticized Pakistan’s army during last week’s conflict with India, according to a copy of the First Information Report (FIR), reviewed by CPJ.

On March 18, about two dozen individuals identifying themselves as police forcibly entered and searched Noorani’s family home in the capital Islamabad, and took his two brothers to an undisclosed location for 30 days.

U.S.-based Noorani told CPJ that he believed his brothers’ forced disappearance was because of his March 17 investigative report, which said the military was misusing its influence over civilian institutions.

CPJ’s text message to information minister Attaullah Tarar requesting comment received no response.