The report titled “Uncovering Pakistan’s secret human rights abuses”, delves into Pakistan’s long battle with militants as part of the post-9/11 “war on terror” and carries the accounts of locals as well as the top leader of the Pashtun Tahaffuz Movement (PTM), Manzoor Pashteen. “The story also violates BBC’s editorial policy by not incorporating the point of view of all stakeholders/citing credible sources/quoting authentic evidence etc,” it continued, adding that it amounted to “indicting the State of Pakistan for so-called ‘secret human rights abuses’ without any cogent evidence”. The government requested that the matter be looked into for “appropriate action against the author and editorial board linked to the story”. Additionally, it demanded that BBC remove “this defamatory and malicious story and issue a clear-cut apology”. “However, despite ISPR’s offer for a detailed interaction, BBC went ahead with its one sided story in violation of its own editorial guidelines and charter,” the dossier stated, listing which editorial guidelines had allegedly been breached.

Source: Pakistan Today June 18, 2019 14:03 UTC