possibly. consider:
last saturday, the news published a report indicating that govt was not cooperating with scotland yard team investigating bb’s murder:
"UK team complains of non-cooperationSaturday, January 19, 2008
By Shakeel Anjum
RAWALPINDI: The Scotland Yard team, visiting the crime site almost daily for the last 14 days, has lodged a written complaint with the President of Pakistan, grumbling that no local investigating or intelligence agency was helping them in their probe into the assassination of Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) chairperson, Ms Benazir Bhutto, reliable sources told ‘The News’…"
scotland yard however denied the story. the news in response did not offer any evidence to counter scotland yard’s denial nor did the paper claim to stand by its original story:
"UK hits out at report on Pak non-cooperation
Sunday, January 20, 2008
…In a rejoinder to the story headlined ‘UK team reports no local cooperation’ by Shakeel Anjum published in The News Saturday, Aiden termed the report absolutely baseless.
Following is the text of the British High Commission official’s rejoinder:
“The Scotland Yard team have received nothing but exemplary hospitality and co-operation since they arrived in Pakistan: almost their first meeting after reaching Islamabad, on 5 January, was with the President himself, who assured them that they would receive the full co-operation of the Pakistani authorities, and this commitment has been honoured at every turn…"
similarly during the hight of ex-cj’s trial, the news published a completely fabricated story on four sc judges with the intention to malign those judges. in response to the story, the reporter was hauled to court where he admitted that the story was a completely lie:
"SC warns newsman, accepts apology Wednesday, June 13, 2007
ISLAMABAD: The 13-member full court of the Supreme Court on Tuesday accepted the unconditional apology of a newsman for filing a report pertaining to the alleged preparation of references against four senior judges of the said bench.
…Muhammad Saleh Zaafir, who is the reporter of the said news items, when confronted with the same, frankly and honestly conceded that he had made no effort to verify the veracity of the allegations levelled in the said news items before publishing the same nor did he have any proof in support of the contents thereof…"
essentially jang group has attempted to malign the government of pak by publishing completely false stories on two of the most important news development of 2007. so what motives would the newspaper have? i believe elements in the newspaper have sold themselve to the highest bidder be it indians or opposition figures. in any normal country, any newspaper that admitted to publishing completely false stories on matters of national importance in a short period would have lost all credibility and would likely have gone out of business. not in pak though. truth does not hold any importance in pak society which explains why pak is where it is. jahaluth is the biggest reason for pak’s backwardness.
