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Pakistan Expels Writer for NY Times

By admin | January 12, 2008

Pakistan has expelled an American journalist who wrote in The New York Times Magazine about the rise of pro-Taliban militants in this key U.S. ally, a media rights group said Saturday.

The Interior Ministry issued a deportation order to Nicholas Schmidle on Tuesday — less than a week after his report “Next-Gen Taliban” appeared in the magazine — said a statement issued by the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists.

“CPJ is unfortunately accustomed to reporting on the government’s attacks on the local media, but now harassment seems to be spreading to foreign journalists as well,” said Joel Simon, the CPJs executive director.

Schmidle’s article, published on Jan. 6, was based on interviews with some of the officials, clerics and fugitive militant leaders who were on the run or fighting security forces in the valley of Swat and in tribal areas along the Afghan border.

To write it, he “secretly traveled” to militant strongholds, prompting authorities to expel him, said a security official on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to media.

Journalists must seek permission from the Interior Ministry before traveling to volatile northwest Pakistan, where al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden and his top deputy Ayman al-Zawahri are thought to be hiding, and where Taliban militants plan attacks on coalition forces in Afghanistan.

Speaking from London on Friday, Schmidle told the CPJ that he was “extremely disappointed at being asked to leave Pakistan,” and that his visa contained “no restrictions whatsoever,” the statement said.

No U.S. Embassy or Pakistani officials were immediately available for comment on the issue.

The magazine’s editor Scott Malcomson told the CJP that authorities did not explain to Schmidle why he was being deported, but he said the expulsion was clearly connected to his writing.

President Pervez Musharraf has reportedly warned that U.S. troops were not welcome to join the fight against al-Qaida on Pakistani soil, despite the growing threat from Islamic extremists.

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