SHC summons senior FIA official on arrests of social media activists

Petitioners want agency to produce list of all detained persons

KARACHI: The Sindh High Court (SHC) has summoned the director or any senior officer of the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) on August 22 to answer its queries regarding the agency's alleged ongoing crackdown against social media activists.

SHC Chief Justice Ahmed Ali M Sheikh, heading a two judge bench, summoned the officer while hearing on Monday a petition challenging the arrests and detentions of online critics in a fresh crackdown by the FIA.

A group of the human rights activisits, journalists and social media activists, including Farieha Aziz, Zohra Yousuf, Ghazi Salahuddin and Jibran Nasir, had approached the court against the detentions, nominating the federal interior minister and FIA director-general as respondents.



In the petition, the activists maintained that the then interior minister had ordered the FIA to initiate action against persons running 'anti-military' campaigns on the internet in the middle of May.

The petitioners said the interior minister had claimed to have taken notice of the online criticism against the armed forces, following the Inter-Services Public Relations' announcement of the withdrawal of a tweet rejecting the inquiry report on the Dawn Leaks issued by the prime minister's office. The petitioners claimed that since then, the FIA detained dozens of people involved in what it called 'an organised campaign' against the country's armed forces on social media. The petitioners added that according to their information, no FIR was registered against most of the individuals who were detained in the crackdown nor did the FIA disclose their identities.

Citing the case of an activist, Adnan Afzal Qureshi, who was arrested in Lahore on May 31 and charged under Section 20 and Section 24 of the Prevention of Electronic Crimes Act (PECA), 2015 and Section 419 and Section 500 of the Pakistan Penal Code, the petitioners said the FIA claimed that the activist was arrested for anti-military tweets and abusive language against military personnel and political leaders.



The judges were told that the FIA had also sent inquiry notices to a number of political and social activists, directing them to appear at the FIA's Counter-Terrorism Wing police station on a specified date and time. The court was informed that the FIA had also seized laptops, phones and other electronic devices owned by the detained individuals without any lawful authority or court warrant in sheer violation of the law.

The petitioners' lawyer, Barrister Salahuddin Ahmed, argued that the arrests revealed that the respondents intended to misuse the PECA to quell freedom of speech. The lawyer added that the Section 20 of PECA pertained to offence against dignity of a natural person, while the Section 24 of PECA pertained to cyber stalking.

PECA does not prohibit criticism of the armed forces, therefore, it provided no basis for the arrests whatsoever, the lawyer said, adding that the alleged criticism of the armed forces could form the basis of charges under Section 419 (punishment for cheating by personation) and Section 500 (defamation) of the Pakistan Penal Code.



The court was pleaded to declare that criticism of the armed forces did not, by itself, amount to a criminal offence and could not be subjected to any coercive action by the state. They also pleaded to restrain the interior ministry and the FIA officials from carrying on investigation and taking or threatening any coercive action against any person, merely for criticising the armed forces.

The court was also requested to direct the FIA to produce a list of the all persons arrested in the crackdown.