LONDON: Pakistan foreign minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi was heckled by a Canadian reporter and gave a speech to mostly empty chairs when attending the Global Conference for Media Freedom in London this week.

Qureshi gave a half-hour speech on Thursday on “media freedom in Pakistan” at a session titled “Strengthening Media Freedom across the Commonwealth” but most international journalists walked out in silent protest, leaving around 15 people in the room.

“There were chairs for 500 people and only 15 people present for the talk. Six of them were Pakistan media, six were Pakistan high commission and foreign office officials and three to four were security. All the journalists emptied the hall out in protest at the censorship in Pakistan,” a source present told TOI.

“Three or four media organisations wanted to protest Qureshi’s presence but the UK government told them not to, so instead they lobbied all the individual journalists and delegates not to attend his session.”

But that did not stop Qureshi making a speech about media freedom in Pakistan.

He said as foreign minister he was representative of a society “that passionately embraces diversity of opinion, accepts dissent and celebrates freedom of expression. Turn on any TV set, pick up any newspaper, any social media platform in Pakistan, and you will be deluged by a cacophony of voices and a multiplicity of perspectives”.

“Pakistan media today is perhaps more free, more diverse, and more forceful than in many across the developing world — perhaps even freer than many other democracies…,” he said.

“Media freedom as a value is dear to me personally and to us as a nation… We have a very independent judiciary so, believe me, there is no question of gagging or controlling the media. With the new social media, even if you want to gag you can gag nothing.”

But that did not convince Canadian reporter Ezra Levant, a news personality with right-wing website TheRebel.media, who had had a blazing row with the minister during the question and answer session over a tweet he wrote on Pakistan’s blasphemy laws that he said the Pakistan government got taken down.

“You censored me. I have a Twitter account in Canada and because I wrote something that traduced some Pakistani blasphemy law, you complained to Twitter which took down my tweet in Canada, so can you explain why your Islamic supremacy in Pakistan is silencing my personal and journalistic freedom in Canada? I know it happens in the USA too. You should be embarrassed. Who the hell are you to censor me in Canada? You don’t like free speech. You shut down my tweet," he shouted.

Qureshi berated him for his “tone and manner”. “I did not censor you or shut down your tweet. How am I responsible for that?” He added, “You have double standards. What you call freedom at times you are projecting certain sectorial agendas (sic).”

Levant responded: “The government of Pakistan did. Shame on you, you censorious thug.”

“This was a silent protest against the UK government inviting the Pakistan foreign minister to speak on media freedom in Pakistan when the media in Pakistan is in complete occupation of the military and journalists from all over the world wanted to show solidarity with Pakistan journalists,” sources told TOI.

Three private TV news channels were suddenly taken off air in Pakistan on July 6 because of their live coverage of a press conference held by opposition figure Maryam Nawaz, daughter of jailed ex-PM Nawaz Sharif .

Shahzeb Jillani, an investigative journalist with Pakistan TV news channel Dunya News, was charged with cyberterrorism for his coverage of enforced disappearances, though the case was eventually dismissed by the courts. A Hamid Mir interview with PPP co-chairman and former president Asif Ali Zardari was stopped within few minutes of broadcasting on Geo News on 1 July. The same day British Pakistani journalist Gul Bukhari tweeted: “The country is under siege by its armed forces”.

The conference was co-hosted by Canadian foreign minister Chrystia Freeland and UK foreign secretary Jeremy Hunt.

Pakistan is ranked 142nd out of 180 countries in the World Press Freedom Index 2019. India is ranked 140th.

