Reporters Without
Borders (Reporters sans frontières) has called on the
Pakistani government to provide early information about
Afghan journalist Sami Yousafzai, held secretly by
Pakistani security forces since 21 April.
He was arrested in the
tribal areas where he was working with American reporter
Eliza Griswold, who was later expelled from the country.
Their driver was also reported missing.
The international press
freedom organisation called for their immediate release,
if they were arrested simply for reporting in Pakistani
tribal areas. It said illtreatment meted out by security
forces to journalist Khawar Mehdi Rizvi during his
recent detention in connection with similar reporting,
made it fear the worst for Yousafzai and his driver.
On 21 April, Griswold, a
freelance reporter and regular contributor to the US
weekly The New Yorker, Yousafzai, stringer for the US
magazine Newsweek, and their driver were arrested at a
checkpoint in Bakhakhel near Bannu as they tried to
enter North Waziristan.
The American journalist
was wearing a burka to avoid being identified. A few
hours earlier they had been turned back at the Jandola
checkpoint controlling entry to the tribal area of South
Waziristan.
A local official
confirmed to Reporters Without Borders that they had
been questioned for several hours and then allowed to
return towards Peshawar. But Pakistani security forces,
the military secret services (ISI), according to some
sources, re-arrested them near Bannu. Griswold was
expelled to the United States within a few days but
Yousafzai and his driver are still being secretly held.
Yousafzai's family, who
live in Peshawar, alerted Newsweek, to which he
contributes regularly on Afghanistan. He lived in
Peshawar for many years before returning to Kabul after
the fall of the Taliban. His by-lined articles on
Afghanistan have appeared in the magazine.
His role in the tribal
areas was apparently as "fixer" for Griswold. They did
not have the special permission demanded by the
Pakistani authorities since the start of the Pakistani
military offensive against armed Taliban and al-Qaeda
groups in the Wana area of South Waziristan.
No foreign journalist
has been able to travel with permission to the region.
However dozens of journalists from the tribal areas and
Pakistani reporters have been able to work there freely.
