The Case of Journalist Hayatullah's Murder in Waziristan (merged)

Society Pakistan & World Affairs
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I am surprised to see no thread on such an important incident in Pakistan. (Or am I looking in the wrong place?)

I am posting Dawn’s editorial:

http://dawn.com/2006/06/18/ed.htm#3

Who killed Hayatullah Khan?

DESPITE being assured by the government and intelligence agencies that the family of the missing journalist Hayatullah Khan would hear something about his whereabouts by June 15, the discovery of his bullet-riddled body on Friday is staggering. Mr Khan “disappeared” in Waziristan in December last year but his family has always maintained that he was picked up by intelligence agencies after he released pictures of remnants of US missiles used in an operation that killed Al-Qaeda leader Hamza Rabia last year. Mr Khan’s photographs clearly refuted the Pakistan army’s claims that Mr Rabia was killed in a blast inside his home. The local Taliban, who were first thought to have been behind Mr Khan’s disappearance, denied that they had any hand in it. Since Mr Khan’s photographs corroborated what the Taliban believed —that US forces were behind Mr Rabia’s death — there is no reason to suspect that local militants would have anything to gain from holding Mr Khan. This is not to say that militants have not posed a threat to journalists covering the situation in tribal areas since the war on terror first began. In February this year, two journalists were killed in an ambush by masked men in Wana — an act many journalists believed was meant to intimidate the press.

Since February’s incident, Reporters Sans Frontier has noted that journalists in the tribal areas have felt increasingly insecure about their safety as they were routinely harassed and threatened. Now with Mr Khan’s gruesome murder, they are likely to feel even more threatened. This makes it all the more imperative for the government to pay heed to international calls for an impartial inquiry into his murder. This is particularly necessary if it wants to disprove the belief that intelligence agencies are behind Mr Khan’s murder — a claim shared not just by the deceased’s family.

I hope whoever is responsible, agency or not, gets the right punishment for this act.

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Re: Journalist’s murder in Waziristan

I posted this in a different “thread”.

http://www.paklinks.com/gs/showthread.php?t=220430

You see free media policy does not apply to local reporters, never really has. Plus, the ISI has a long history of abducting people and torturing and killing them.

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Re: Journalist’s murder in Waziristan

http://www.thenews.com.pk/daily_detail.asp?id=11367

His brother is saying with some degree of believability that there was not even an “iota of doubt” in the family’s mind about “who or which agency had held him”. What is even more ominous is what apparently transpired during a meeting, which his brother says he had with intelligence officials on May 15. They, he says, told him that he would hear about his brother in a month’s time. The family has also said that intelligence officials had assured them repeatedly that Hayatullah was alive and well and that he had been detained on matters relating to national security

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Re: Journalist's murder in Waziristan

It's most likely that he was killed by the Taliban or Al Qaida terrorists.

The government has announced an indepenent judicial enquiry, which is a first in Pakistan, and a very encouraging move.

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Re: Journalist’s murder in Waziristan

Media have to be careful in Pakistan. Only big news organisations have the ability to show some kind of resistance. Smaller regional ones and this poor guy just ‘disappear’, like many others the govt doesn’t like

From the same article
http://www.thenews.com.pk/daily_detail.asp?id=11367

He was kidnapped by five masked armed men on Dec. 5 after he released photographs, which provided documentary proof that a US missile had in fact killed senior al Qaeda leader Hamza Rabia in North Waziristan on Dec. 1.

This would have embarrassed both the US and Pakistan’s governments especially the latter since it has always said that there is no US intrusion of any kind into its territory along the Afghan border. At that time, his family had suspected that he had been picked up by an intelligence agency and brought his disappearance to the media’s attention.

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Re: Journalist’s murder in Waziristan

Pakistan’s arsenal has a lot of US missiles does it not?

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Re: Journalist's murder in Waziristan

[QUOTE]
Plus, the ISI has a long history of abducting people and torturing and killing them.
[/QUOTE]
Sounds like the history of Iltaf Hussain to me!!

[QUOTE]
I hope whoever is responsible, agency or not, gets the right punishment for this act.
[/QUOTE]
Absolutely...

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Re: Journalist's murder in Waziristan

It is highly unlikely that he was killed by taliban(locals) or alqaedah mujahideen.

Even hamid Mir in his todays column in jang hinted agencies for this.

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Re: Journalist's murder in Waziristan

bao-bihari:

[quote]
alqaedah mujahideen.
[/quote]

Please don't denigrate the word jihad by associating it with fitnah-mongers.

By the way, I was just wondering why there was no uproar when all these agencies ("ISI") were busy playing games in Karachi through MQM Haqiqi. And its not that I support Altaf. It's just that what is wrong should be considered wrong irrespective of who will get benefit from it.

These military agencies have always played havoc with civilian politics. But our great opposition parties are making loud noises only now. Probably because it gives their al-Qaeda "the murderer" mujahideen look a bit ... ummm ... innocent.

In any case, it was great if something good comes out of this hue and cry from MMA-mullahs or Baba-Bibi. Somebody needs to teach these agencies a lesson.

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Re: Journalist’s murder in Waziristan

ISLAMABAD: The federal government appointed Justice Muhammad Raza Khan of the Peshawar High Court (PHC) on Monday to investigate the murder of journalist Hayatullah Khan in the tribal areas. According to a notification by the Ministry of Law, the inquiry commission, consisting of Justice Khan, will start its inquiry immediately and submit a report of its findings within 30 days. The commission will “ascertain causes of the murder of Hayatullah Khan and judge the correctness of allegations regarding his killing besides identifying the persons responsible for the mischief”, the statement said. Hayatullah’s body was found handcuffed and shot in the back in Mir Ali in North Waziristan on June 16.

http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2006\06\20\story_20-6-2006_pg1_4

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The Case of Murdered Journalist

Intelligence agents trapped my husband: Hayatullah’s widow

Staff Report

PESHAWAR: The widow of murdered tribal journalist, Hayatullah Khan, has alleged that her husband was “trapped” by the country’s secret services.

“One intelligence agent called Hayatullah to file a story and gave him the pictures of a Hellfire missile used to attack a compound in the tribal areas to expose the US atrocities against Muslims,” Mehrunisa, Hayatullah’s widow, said while talking to the BBC Pushto Service.

Hayatullah’s body was found on June 16 after he went missing on December 5, 2005. “He was called by secret service agents in the evening on December 2, 2005 asking him to write a story regarding the attack. More than 20 phone calls were made to my husband,” she said in her first interview since the gruesome murder of the 29-year-old tribal journalist.

Mehrunnisa said that she had told Hayatullah that intelligence agents were his “enemy” but Hayatullah did not “listen to me”.She said, “I know the names of secret agents who are involved in kidnapping Hayatullah”. However, she refused to disclose the names.

Mehrunnisa, who is a school teacher in Mir Ali in North Waziristan, said that both Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz and President Pervez Musharraf know who kidnapped and killed Hayatullah. “What is the purpose of holding an inquiry when you know everything,” she said.

She also vowed to bring Hayatullah’s killers to justice and quoted her husband as saying, “If I die, I will be a martyr and if I return I will be hero”. Meanwhile, international media rights group, Reporters Without Borders, urged Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz to accept the demands of journalists following the murder of kidnapped reporter Hayatullah.

“We support the call for an independent head of the investigative commission and that it should include at least one journalist, to uncover the truth about the abduction and death of Hayatullah,” the organisation said on Monday in a statement issued in Paris. “If this murder goes unpunished, all journalists will consider the state as an enemy of investigative reporters,” the statement said. The statement said that another Pakistani journalist, Munir Mengal, head of the Baloch-language TV channel Baloch Voice, was abducted from the Karachi International Airport on April 7 by intelligence personnel. “The fate of Hayatullah Khan makes us fear for the life of Munir Mengal and we call for his immediate release,” the organisation said

http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default…-6-2006_pg7_30

Mustaches
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Re: The Case of Murdered Journalist

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/5096008.stm

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Re: The Case of Murdered Journalist

http://www.paklinks.com/gs/showthread.php?t=220543

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Re: The Case of Murdered Journalist

Hayatullah Khan kids.

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Re: The Case of Murdered Journalist

thanks for the update bro.