Journalist Taha Siddiqui escapes alleged kidnapping attempt by '10-12 armed men'
ISLAMABAD: Pakistani journalist, Taha Siddiqui known for criticising his country’s military establishment, claimed on Wednesday that he had narrowly escaped being kidnapped by armed men, in an incident that came months after he complained of being harassed by security services.
Siddiqui, who reports for France 24 and is the Pakistan bureau chief of Indian television channel WION, alleged that the abduction took place while he was being driven by a taxi to the airport serving the capital Islamabad and the neighbouring, larger garrison city of Rawalpindi.
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“I was on my way to airport today at 8:20 am when 10-12 armed men stopped my cab & forcibly tried to abduct me. I managed to escape. Safe and with police now,” Siddiqui tweeted from a friend’s Twitter account early in the morning.
“Looking for support in any way possible #StopEnforcedDisappearances,” he added in the same tweet.
Last year, five Pakistani bloggers went missing for several weeks before four of them were released.
The military has staunchly denied playing a role in any enforced disappearances, as has the civilian government.
Siddiqui spoke to Reuters from a police station where he was filing a report on the incident, and described how his taxi was stopped on the highway when another vehicle swerved, and braked suddenly in front of it.
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About a dozen men armed with rifles and revolvers pulled him out of the cab, beat him and “threatened to kill” him, he said.
“They threw me in the back of the vehicle in which I had been travelling, but the door on the other side was open,” Siddiqui added.
“I jumped out and ran, and was able to get into a taxi that was nearby, whose driver then floored it.”
In a police statement, seen by Reuters, Siddiqui said during the kidnap attempt he appealed for help from a military vehicle that was passing by.
“I saw a military vehicle and shouted for help but one of the abductors gestured (the vehicle) to move on and they did,” Siddiqui said in the police statement, adding he had previously been “intimidated” by civilian and military security officials.
Siddiqui pleaded with police to help him recover his personal belongings – laptop computer, phone, hard drives, passport and suitcase – and provide him and his family with “police protection”.
“My life is under threat,” he said in the statement.
Siddiqui last year filed a court petition to stop the agency from harassing him.
Taha, in a recent tweet also stated that he will brief the media over the incident in detail today.
I m headed to Islamabad Press Club to do presser abt wht happened to me today morning. Pls cover. Registered case at Koral Police Station. Finally reconnected on social media & got new phone. Thank u all for support. I shall not b silenced. Pls reshare #StopEnforcedDisappearances
— Taha Siddiqui (@TahaSSiddiqui) January 10, 2018
Tweeting local journalist Cyril Almeida’s Twitter account, Taha Siddiqui said, “This is Taha Siddiqui (@TahaSSiddiqui) using Cyrils a/c. I was on my way to airport today at 8:20am whn 10-12 armed men stopped my cab & forcibly tried to abduct me. I managed to escape. Safe and with police now. Looking for support in any way possible #StopEnforcedDisappearances”
This is Taha Siddiqui (@TahaSSiddiqui) using Cyrils a/c. I was on my way to airport today at 8:20am whn 10-12 armed men stopped my cab & forcibly tried to abduct me. I managed to escape. Safe and with police now. Looking for support in any way possible #StopEnforcedDisappearances
— cyril almeida (@cyalm) January 10, 2018
— cyril almeida (@cyalm) January 10, 2018
In May 2017, the Islamabad High Court (IHC) restrained the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) from harassing Taha Siddiqui who approached the court seeking protection from the investigative body.
Justice Aamer Farooq issued notices to the agency for May 29 with directions to “act strictly in accordance with law and the petitioner shall not be harassed.”
Petitioner Taha Shakeel Siddiqui had filed a plea in the high court through his counsel Asma Jahangir, requesting the court to direct the FIA to desist ‘from harassing citizens simply because they have expressed a view or are carrying out their professional duties’.
According to the petition, Siddiqui received a phone call from an officer in the FIA’s counter-terrorism wing, deputy director Noman Bodla, on May 18, 2017. Bodla allegedly asked Siddiqui to appear before him at the FIA Headquarters for interrogation. Petitioner said that the interrogation, as the officer had hinted, was about some journalistic articles Siddiqui had written.
The book has been translated into English and rechristened as ‘Freedom of the Press: The War on Words (1977-1978)’
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Every body knows who are the abductors? But the problem is who will tie the bell in cat’s neck? The only solution is just drop journalism.Recommend
Original news : https://tribune.com.pk/story/1605232/1-journalist-taha-siddiqui-escapes-alleged-kidnapping-attempt-10-12-armed-men/