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Alert

Authorities deny holding journalist Khawar Mehdi Rizvi

(RSF/IFEX) - RSF has voiced dismay at a "state lie" told to High Court judges in Karachi by a high ranking Federal Intelligence Authority (FIA) official. The official denied that the FIA has been holding journalist Khawar Mehdi Rizvi.

Rizvi, who had been working with two French journalists, Marc Epstein and Jean-Paul Guilloteau, from the weekly "L'Express", has just entered his third week of detention at the hands of the security services and has regularly been shown on the PTV public television station.

RSF is distressed by this lie, which involves exhibiting, on television, a journalist who is secretly being held in detention, while at the same time denying to judges that he is imprisoned. The organisation has renewed its appeal to the Pakistani government to release the Pakistani journalist and allow the French journalists to return to their own country.

The 30 December 2003 denial by the FIA official before the Sindh High Court that it was holding Rizvi followed the lodging of a habeas corpus petition by Rizvi's family lawyer, Abid Saqi, in a bid to end his detention. The judges, who said they were not satisfied with the reply from the authorities, have ordered the FIA's national director to appear in court on 13 January 2004 to explain the reasons for holding Rizvi.

Rizvi, a freelance journalist who regularly works with foreign reporters, has appeared at least three times in news stories on PTV state television. The station has also broadcast false testimonies intended to prove that the three journalists had put together a fake report in Baluchistan, a region bordering Afghanistan.

The two French journalists remain under house arrest in a Karachi hotel after being released on bail on 24 December. They are waiting for a verdict that is expected by 10 January 2004 at the latest.

The three journalists were arrested on 16 December in Karachi, just after they had finished a report on Taliban groups near the Afghanistan border. The Pakistani authorities have charged the two French journalists with travelling to the Quetta region without permission.