Violence-free Pakistan Campaign: Text of CPNE declaration

The first All Parties Conference unanimously accepted the text declaration issued by the CPNE.

KARACHI: The Council of Pakistan Newspaper Editors Registered (CPNE) secretary general Aamir Mahmood has issued for the media, the text of the declaration which was unanimously accepted by the first All Parties Conference in connection with the CPNE's Violence-free Pakistan Campaign.

At the all parties conference, the Pakistan Peoples Party, Muttahida Qaumi Movement, Awami National Party, Sindh Tarraqi Pasand Party, Awami Tehrik, National Party, Sindh United Party, Jamaat-e-Islami, Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam, Sunni Rahbar Council, Jafariya Alliance, Karachi Press Club, Karachi Union of Journalists, Pakistan Medical Association, Human Rights Commission, CPLC and Sindh Police as well as representatives of other civil society and media organizations accepted the declaration.

In this declaration, declaring peace and security and freedom from violence to be necessary for the country's politics, media organizations and journalists were asked not to publish or broadcast any comment, news, topic or content wherein people are in any way incited to violence or declared waajib ul-qatl (deserving of death). The electronic media should not present as heroes individuals who are involved in activities of violence or murder; they should instead expose political, non-political, religious and non-religious groups in which militant factions exist. In the declaration, media policy-making organizations and individuals were called upon to emphasise the promotion of harmony, brotherhood and respect for each others' opinion and for the law.

In the declaration, political and religious parties were asked to expel violent elements from their ranks in order to restore an atmosphere of unity and concord in the country. In the declaration, political and religious leaders were called upon to unequivocally oppose violence in their speeches and writings and to refrain from spreading hate against some other party or group.

The joint session of the all parties conference also resolved that political parties should not intervene politically in administrative and judicial action taken against individuals involved in violence. Through the declaration, the participants expressed the resolution not to use or display weapons in their assemblies, processions and congregations and to respect the freedom of the media and to abstain from pressuring the media in any way.

In the declaration, the government of Pakistan was asked to ban all such arms-producing factories that besides defense equipment, also produce for private use ammunition, weapons, guns, pistols, bombs and gunpowder. In the declaration, a demand was raised to ban throughout the country the use and display of legal and illegal weapons at special occasions, wedding-related events, rallies, assemblies and processions and to conduct a crackdown against them and their users, with indiscriminate action taken against all such events and harsh punishments awarded to those responsible.

In the declaration, a recommendation has been presented that in order to keep weapons, special cards like the national identity cards should be issued and the display of those cards should be declared to be obligatory for those carrying licensed ammunition and weapons. In the declaration, the demand was also raised that licenses of weapon-carrying guards accompanying leaders of political and religious parties must be checked and they should be prevented from displaying weapons. In the declaration, it has been said that weapons users should be closely monitored and according to the information obtained from this, there should be raids on the dens of law-breaking elements (so that) illegal weapons can be recovered. In short, in order to find such dens, all modern methods including celluloid technology should be used.

In the joint declaration, a insistent demand was put to the government that it should immediately dissolve all non-government and militant groups and that the young men associated with them should be specially trained/educated so that quitting a violent trend, they should play a positive role in society.

Published in The Express Tribune, February 1^st,  2011.