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Pakistan journalists protest closure of two TV channels

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan’s journalists held countrywide protests on Saturday against the closure of Geo TV and ARY One World’s news operations in Dubai.

The closure caught both channels unawares, and Geo openly blamed President Musharraf for using his influence with the ruler of Dubai to have the channel shut down.

“Geo TV, Pakistan’s premier Urdu news channel, also seen round the world as the main source of news and current affairs, was shut down at 1 a.m. Pakistan time (midnight Dubai time) on Saturday after President Pervez Musharraf put tremendous pressure to silence a media outlet which had refused to bow down to his dictates,” the private channel said in a statement.

The channels were banned in Pakistan following the November 3 emergency but they continued to broadcast programmes via satellite from their head offices at the Dubai Media Centre.

Few in Pakistan’s media world expected that the Dubai authorities would move against the two channels.

In Islamabad, journalists took out a protest rally, while in Karachi, they held a demonstration outside the Geo office. Protests were also held in Lahore.

Geo, which said it received a two-hour closure notice from the Dubai authorities, immediately ran live phone-in reactions from politicians, civil society activists and others condemning the closure.

“We were in negotiations with the [Pakistan] government until Friday. But the government wanted control over some editorial decisions to filter the political content of our news programmes. We refused to comply,” Hamid Mir, who anchored the popular current affairs talk show Capital Talk, told The Hindu.

The government wanted the TV channel to pull his programme as well as Mere Mutabiq (According to Me), anchored by Shahid Masood, but Geo refused to toe the line on this too.

Mr. Mir said Geo was yet to chalk out any alternative plan, predicting it could take two to three months for anything to take shape. Two Western countries offered to base Geo, but it would be difficult for the TV station to move all its operations out of the region, he said.

Mohsin Raza Khan, Director News at ARY One World, said his channel was given no reason for the closure. Other ARY channels had been permitted to continue broadcasting from Dubai.

Before shifting its operations to Dubai, ARY was based in London. Mr. Khan said the company might decide to revive its London operations, but nothing was planned yet.

In a statement, ARY said the action against it was “unfounded” as it always abided by the “Pakistan First” motto. Calling for resolving the crisis through dialogue, ARY said the closure damaged Pakistan’s hard-earned moderate image.

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