Reporting the Court’s decision, Dawn carried the headline, Commission free to record Haqqani’s testimony via video: SC. According to this report, the Court favoured Haqqani’s plea and urged the memo commission to provide the former Ambassador with video link facilities.

The Supreme Court on Tuesday ruled that the judicial commission probing the memo scandal could record Husain Haqqani’s testimony via video link from London, DawnNews reported.

A three-judge bench of the apex court, headed by Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry, heard Haqqani’s petition urging it to allow him the video link facility on security grounds.

The court ruled that the commission could record Haqqani’s testimony through video link if it thought fit.

The News/Geo, however, carried a very different headline about the same hearing: ‘SC rejects Haqqani’s video link plea’.

The Supreme Court (SC) resumed proceedings on a plea of Husain Haqqani, former Pakistan’s ambassador to the US, seeking its direction for the judicial commission to record his statement via video conferencing that was rejected by the court.

Ironically, both of these reports can be technically true, even though they are giving very different perceptions. The Supreme Court appears to have decided that it would not interfere directly in the commission’s proceedings, so it gave its advice to the commission to comply with Husain Haqqani’s request while not actually ordering it to do so.

Unfortunately, the article in The News/Geo does not provide this information, allowing for the misperception that the Supreme Court believes that Haqqani should not be allowed to record his statement via video link when, in fact, it said the opposite. Dawn, on the other hand, gave a more full accounting of the facts. We do not know why The News/Geo reported the Supreme Court’s decision the way it did, but we are concerned that people getting their information from these media outlets may be misinformed about what the Court actually said.

In a post titled ‘Fragmented Media, Fragmented Nation’ earlier this year we asked, ‘How can we agree on how to solve the most important issues facing the nation if we can’t even agree on what the most important issues are?’ In the case of the Supreme Court’s decision on Haqqani’s video link plea, media may agree on the issue, but by leaving out certain facts, some groups are fragmenting the nation by creating confusion about what actually happened. In order for the public to make informed decisions, we need all the facts – not only those that are convenient to a particular agenda.

We would also like to give special recognition to Express Tribune who, like The News/Geo originally reported that the Supreme Court had rejected Haqqani’s plea. Realising the mistake, the editors quickly corrected the report to reflect the facts. Additionally, the editors left a ‘Correction’ notice to prevent further confusion about why the report had changed:

Correction: Express News had earlier reported that the Supreme Court had rejected Haqqani’s application. This is incorrect. The application was referred to the judicial commission. The correction has been made.

We have noted in the past that mistakes happen, and media groups can earn the public’s trust by admitting their mistake and quickly correcting it rather than becoming defensive and making excuses. Express Tribune‘s correction note is an excellent example of responsible journalism that sets a standard which other media groups should be encouraged to follow. We look forward to a similar correction by The News/Geo.

“As we are ratcheting up pressure on Iran, it seems somewhat inexplicable that Pakistan would be trying to negotiate a pipeline,” the secretary said. “And there is an alternative that we do strongly support — the Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India pipeline.”

The United States believed that it was a better alternative both in terms of predictability and to avoid doing business with Iran, she said.

In its editorial of 2nd March, Dawn characterised the US approach as unwelcome pressure and stated that ‘America would do well not to link Pakistan’s power requirements with Iran’s nuclear issue’.

Now, another nation has stepped in to discourage the construction of the Iran-Pakistan, but they way it is reported is noticeably different. According to a headline in Dawn, S. Arabia offers to help to tide over energy crisis. And what is this ‘help’?

Riyadh is said to have offered an ‘alternative package’ to meet Islamabad’s growing energy needs in an effort to persuade it to abandon the Iran gas pipeline and electricity/oil import deals.

When the US discourages the Iran-Pakistan pipeline and offers an alternative, it is described as unwelcome pressure. But when Saudi Arabia discourages the Iran-Pakistan pipeline and offers an alternative, it is described as ‘help’.

The difference in photos accompanying the stories should also be noted. The report about the American statement is accompanied by a photo of the President Zardari and President Ahmedinejad.

The report about the Saudi statement, however, is accompanied by a photo of Interior Minister Rehman Malik smiling with the Saudi Deputy Foreign Minister.

This blog does not take a position on whether the Iran-Pakistan pipeline is a good or bad decision. But we do think it is important to ask why the media portrays so differently the same message delivered by two different sources.

What didn’t make headlines was this line buried in a report by Dawn:

“We are not in the administration. We do not even represent the US Congress,” said the congressman, adding that he could only provide moral support.

Even Dawn‘s report carried the headline, ‘Two US congressmen vow to back Baloch insurgents’, which could easily give the false impression that Rohrabacher is a new ‘Charlie Wilson’ sending arms and training to insurgents, even though Dawn also reported that the Congressman specifically that he has no power to provide anything but ‘moral support’ to Baloch insurgents.

It should also be noted that a Google News search of American media showed that no mainstream media groups covered his speech. It made headlines in Pakistan, but in the US it was completely ignored. If there really was American support for Baloch separatists, wouldn’t this have been headlines there as well?

On the Internet, a ‘troll’ is someone who says sensational and inflammatory things in order to be provoke an emotional response from otherwise rational people. The Congressman Rohrabacher continues to give sensationalist speeches, even though he admits that he does not even represent the US Congress. Is he playing the part of a media ‘troll’? Looking at the facts, it seems that Rohrabacher is getting the last laugh and playing our media like a drum.

Mubasher Lucman and Najam Sethi may both talk about the same issue on their shows, but their viewers are likely to take away very different perceptions. Fans of Mubasher Lucman are likely to think that Najam Sethi is a liberal and possibly a paid agent of America. Fans of Najam Sethi, on the other hand, are more likely to think Mubasher Lucman is right-wing and possibly a paid agent of the establishment. They watch the person whose views align more closely with their own, and dismiss the views of the other.

This phenomenon is not confined to talk shows either. Are the same people reading The Friday Times reading The Nation also? How much overlap is there between readers of The News (Jang Group) and Dawn? While there is probably some overlap between readers of these large circulation newspapers, how many The News fans cannot stand Nadeem Paracha? And how many Dawn readers refuse to read anything by Ikram Sehgal?

But it’s not just the personalities that differentiate media groups. Each group’s editors also makes decisions about what stories to emphasise and which to play down. As an experiment, we looked at several major newspapers on Friday to see what was considered headline news. What we found was interesting.

In the English media, The Nation, Express Tribune, and Dawn each carried two front page stories about contempt charges against the PM. The News carried seven. On first two inside pages, neither Express Tribune nor Dawn published additional stories. The Nation added one, and The News filled almost the entire second page with two more bringing their total number of articles on the first two pages about the PM’s legal troubles to a grand total of nine – six more than the next closest paper!

We then looked at editorial pages. Express Tribune and Dawn both published editorials about the issue. The Nation did not. Here again, The News stood out by publishing an editorial right next to a major opinion piece by the editor, Mohammad Malick, also!

Things were even more interesting when we compared to Urdu media. Nawa-e-Waqt carried 9 front page articles about the issue, Daily Express and Jang both carried 11. The front pages of Urdu newspapers are notoriously crammed, but 11 articles on the same story?

Nawa-e-Waqt had nothing on the first two interior pages, while Daily Express added two more and Jang added an additional three.

This was fascinating to us. For readers of The News or Jang, charges against the PM didn’t seem like a story, it seemed like the only story.

It should also be noted that The Nation, the only English language newspaper that had no editorial about the issue, used most of its editorial space to write about Kashmir, NATO and the WTO.

What does all this mean? We think it indicates that the media may becoming increasingly fragmented. Rather than competing over quality reporting, different media groups are simply providing different groups ‘news’ that reinforces their point of view. Liberals have liberal voices to look to for analysis, conservatives have conservative voices, and with online publishing fueling the growth of alternative media, extremists and conspiracy mongers have their own media groups also.

As a result, society is becoming increasingly fragmented. People assume that those they don’t agree with are liars or hypocrites. They don’t understand how someone can possibly see things in a different way since everyone they read and listen to agrees with them. Certain positions become “obvious” or “undebatable”. What they don’t realise is that the other guy is thinking the exact same thing about him.

Fragmented media might be a good business model by allowing media groups to focus on appealing to one specific niche market, but the question should be asked whether it also creates problems for society. Readers of Jang are likely to think that PM’s contempt case is the most pressing issue of the nation, while readers of The Nation might think that national security takes center stage. How can we agree on how to solve the most important issues facing the nation if we can’t even agree on what the most important issues are?

Unfortunately, there are no easy answers for this. The most readily available solution, though, may be to change our habits as media consumers. We should challenge ourselves by not only consuming that media that reinforces our own beliefs, but should also consider the points of those we disagree with. In order to do this, we should not limit ourselves to one or two media groups that we are comfortable with, but should venture outside our comfort zone to see how other media groups are reporting the news. And if we see that one media group, for example, is treating a story completely differently than every other media group, maybe we should ask ourselves if they are reporting the news…or trying to influence it.

A report in The News today serves as an excellent example of how the media’s power to shape the way we perceive events can be used to serve a political agenda. According to reporter Sohail Khan, former Senator Azam Swati (PTI) through his counsel Tariq Asad has petitioned the Supreme Court to place the name of President Asif Zardari on the Exit Control List. Why? Because an article in The New York Times said that Zardari could be planning to leave the country after 27th December. Swati’s counsel argued that this raised a question of public importance per Article 184(3).

A few things should be noted here. First is the New York Times article which serves as the basis of Swati’s petition. Here is the part that Swati quotes:

Some Pakistani and Western officials said last week that if Mr. Zardari returned, it could be only for a cameo appearance before Dec. 27, the fourth anniversary of the death of Ms. Bhutto, the two-time former prime minister, in a gun and bomb attack in the city of Rawalpindi, near Islamabad.

After that, Mr. Zardari would probably leave for a long — perhaps permanent — convalescence in London or Dubai, the officials said.

Who are these “Pakistani and Western officials”? Nobody knows. Are they opposition party members or some other kind of agents? Do they have any way of knowing the president’s plans, or is this pure speculation based on thin air and wishful thinking?

Additionally, the same New York Times article also says that “General Kayani told the United States ambassador at the time, Anne W. Patterson, that he “might, however reluctantly,” pressure Mr. Zardari to resign and presumably leave Pakistan”. Would this not result in a question of public importance per Article 184(3) also? Why does Swati selectively quote The New York Times article? Is it because he is using the media to report the facts or to promote a political agenda?

Actually, Azam Swati is not the only one who selectively quotes from the foreign media. In his own petition to the Supreme Court, Swati notes that “the news of NYT has been reported by all the newspapers of Pakistan”, giving it extra importance. But these reports also selectively quote the original article.

The Nation reported the Times story with the headline, ‘Zardaris return cameo appearance’, as if it were a statement of fact and not a speculation attributed to unknown people. And in its report, The Nation conveniently left out the part where Ambassador Patterson claims that Gen Kayani told her he was contemplating a coup.

The News included even less in its report, saying the Times “quoted some Pakistani and Western officials”, but failing to note that nobody knows who these “officials” are. The News even went further and removed every part of the original New York Times story about the military threatening the civilian government and making it seem like the president was thinking of running from the country.

Dawn pared the original report down to little more than just a headline, but at did note the Times’ claim that the Supreme Court was being “pushed by the Army” to investigate the president.

This was reported the same way in Urdu papers also. Jang carried the story as a brief news piece suggesting there was reason to believe the president might leave. Nawa-i-Waqt carried the brief version of the story as well, and Express even added a little touch of its own by reporting that “according to New York Times report, 27 pakistani officials and western ‘diplomats’ have said that his return is temporary” – none of which actually appears in the New York Times story.

In other words, there is a petition before the Supreme Court that is based on media reports that selectively summarise a foreign media report that paraphrases the speculation of unidentified people. As a result, the people’s perception of events may have been manipulated, and what they believe is reality may actually be a carefully designed version of reality that better serves a political end. Ironically, the foreign media group at the foundation of this case is one that is routinely criticised for “publishing anti-Pakistani reports” that are “planted to derail a country like Pakistan” when the claims it reports are viewed less favourably.

The public interest is not defined by political ends, but by knowing the truth. This is a shared responsibility of both media and judiciary. If one fails, it can cause the other to fail also. Reporting rumours and innuendo is not journalism, and legal decisions based on such rumours and innuendo is not justice. If the media fails to do its job responsibly, it can have disastrous consequences.

On Tuesday, President Zardari left for Dubai to receive medical treatment. Within minutes, the media circus began and rumours of a coup began to circulate. While no one has yet to provide a single piece of evidence suggesting that Zardari will resign or a coup is imminent, the story continues to dominate media headlines.

Part of the reason may be attributed to the way government officials like to give out as little information as possible, opening the doors to speculation. Arif Rafiq, a US-based consultant on Middle East and South Asian political and security issues, wrote on The Pakistan Policy Blog yesterday that Farhatullah Babar’s statement was clearly not the whole truth, which resulted in some journalists jumping at the opportunity to attack the president. This theory was echoed by Tariq Butt in The News the next day.

While a lack of fully forthcoming statements is a problem, especially in politics, it does not excuse reckless and irresponsible behaviour on the part of the media. Official spokesmen have a responsibility to give the press true and accurate information. But if they don’t, it does not give journalists license to simply make up whatever they wish were true.

One of the reasons the rumours took on such a life was that they were being reported not only by the well-known anti-Zardari types, but even those such as Najam Sethi whose show on Tuesday night helped fan the flames of rumour and speculation.

Frankly, we were surprised by Sethi’s tone. This is, after all, the same journalist who strongly criticised exactly this behaviour just a few months ago.

Some well-known journalists have been predicting the end of the Zardari regime for over a year now by regularly giving D-Day deadlines. But President Asif Ali Zardari continues to defy their hollow predictions, prompting Javed Hashmi to wisecrack that a PhD in politics may be required to fathom his brand of politics. Considering how very consistently wrong they have proven to be, one may be forgiven for wondering whether it is lack of intelligence or scarcity of credible sources that lies at the root of their helplessness and rage. Or is it plain wishful thinking and personal vendettas that are masquerading as serious front-page political analyses?

Given that this was an unusual deviation for Sethi, and his claim to have been receiving word from ‘sources’, the rumour was given credibility. And yet, as the days go by, any actual substance to the rumours remains elusive, and the story has shifted from reports of speculation to reports about reports of speculation. Is there anything sillier than media reporting about how it’s reporting about rumours?

That’s not to say the rumour-mongering has stopped. Multiple newspapers including Dawn and The News reported on Thursday that a US magazine (Foreign Policy) claimed that President Zardari “may resign from office on account of ill health”. The News featured the story prominently on the front page. Despite the sensational headlines, the article they are reporting about actually says something quite different.

The original article by Josh Rogin does not report that the president may resign over ill health – that was only one speculation by an unnamed former US official. Actually, the article’s greater speculation is whether the military is plotting a coup against the government. But again, even in the Foreign Policy article, this is only rumour and speculation.

Moreover, what our media is not reporting is that the same magazine updated their article to say that the president will not resign, and that “The rumors of a silent coup are sometimes a way of trying to effect a silent coup”. Additionally, Foreign Policy published a new report yesterday saying that “Zardari won’t resign”. Will Jang consider this worthy of front page news also?

As the actual story of the president’s health condition and treatment lay to rest rumours of coups and resignations, responsible journalists should take note of what ‘sources’ were giving them what information. There they might find a much more enlightening story than the silliness we’ve been fed over the past few days.

In concluding his piece, points to specific proof that the Americans know nothing about Afghanistan.

Before talking to the Taliban and the Haqqanis or taking them head-on with even greater vigour, the US and its allies would need to know more about these groups. As former US and Nato military commander in Afghanistan Gen Stanley McChrystal recently admitted, the US began the Afghan war with a frighteningly simplistic view and still lacked the knowledge to achieve a successful end.

An example of this paucity of knowledge about Afghanistan was on display recently when a picture of the late Afghan mujahideen leader Maulvi Yunis Khalis standing with President Ronald Reagan at the White House in the 1980s was mentioned as that of Jalaluddin Haqqani, who had never visited the US.

Only problem, this error was made not by the American media, but by Pakistani media, including Jang Group’s own Geo TV.

While Rahimullah Yusufzai may be correct “knowing thy enemy should be the first principle for the US prior to undertaking any new step towards making war or pursuing peace”, he accidentally suggests that perhaps we should be taking a look at ourselves also.

The photo, which had been circulating online for a few days provided damning evidence of American duplicity and backed up claims that Haqqani was CIA’s ‘blue eyed boy’. Only problem, no Haqqani appeared in the photo. Actually, it showed Mohammad Younis Khalis with former US President Ronald Reagan.

This is an easy mistake to make. Long beard, turban…they all pretty much look the same, right? And if the point of printing the photo was to embarrass the Americans, are the facts really more important than the message?

The funny thing is, as easy a mistake as this was for Dawn to make, it was just as easy to avoid. If you notice, the photo published by Dawn includes a watermark that says ‘TIME&LIFE PICTURES gettyimages’. These watermarks are tools used by media companies to protect their copyrighted material. The idea is that a publisher will not want to publish a photo that has writing all over it, and if they do, the copyright holder will know that they did not pay the proper licensing fee to use the photo.

One of the major companies to license images to publishers is GettyImages, and it is their watermark that appears on Dawn‘s photo. We decided to do a little photo research and discovered that, yes, this photo of Ronald Reagan and Mohammad Younis Khalis is a copyrighted image that can be licensed from GettyImages. The cost to license the photo? $118.

If Dawn would have researched the photo – and the source was printed across the front of it, so it wasn’t hard to track down – they would have seen that it was not Jalaluddin Haqqani, but Mohammad Younis Khalis. Instead, they printed the photo without doing any fact checking.

Oh, and as for photos of Jalaluddin Haqqani enjoying chai samosa with an American president, they don’t exist. But only because, despite the eager claims of media commentators, he never went to US. But hey, why let the facts get in the way of a good story!

Talat Hussain’s response to the situation in Dawn notes that “the provincial capital, has slipped into hellish violence, its peace buried under the ever-increasing piles of dead bodies”. And where does the senior journalist lay blame for this hell on earth? Where else, but the convenient scapegoat of President Zardari and the PPP-led government.

There are several problems with this piece by Talat Hussain, but we will mention only two. First is that the author’s thesis rests on one initial premise that completely misses the point – namely, that it is not “Sindh” that slipped into a war-like state of violence, but Karachi. This is important to note because Talat Hussain’s blame game rests on the fact that the provincial government is indeed led by the PPP. But despite being in Sindh province, Karachi is not controlled by PPP. This is an important point because the complex politics in Karachi are behind much of the violence there. It is hard to believe that Talat Hussain does not know this.

Actually, it would be wrong to lay the blame at the feet of any single political party, though it is a common reaction by party activists to blame their opponents by terming them as gangsters. This gets to the second major problem with Talat Hussain’s column – in order to place blame with Zardari and the PPP, he oversimplifies a complex situation.

According to Talat Hussain, the solution to the crisis in Karachi is simple.

It is important to recount all of this to contextualise the endemic problem of violence in Karachi. These incidents do not happen without warning. There is a well-established pattern followed by any serious law and order breakdown. It is for the government to closely monitor this pattern and position resources and strategies to ensure that the slide down the path of chaos is halted. It is also for the government to engineer long-term and effective administrative solutions to address chronic sources of violence.

In the case of Karachi, this means taking on gangs that have virtually overthrown the writ of the state from vast swathes of the city and run these areas like their fiefdoms. The attempt to disinfect the city of these gangs through `reconciliation` was bound to fail since most of these gangs are politically aligned, with their roots embedded in the provincial body politic. You might set a thief to catch a thief, but that is hardly the way to deal with killers.

The PPP government and all of the party leadership should know this. After all, they have been the biggest proponents of strong-arm action against extremists in Fata and elsewhere, saying that this is the only way to deal with, in American idiom, `irreconcilables`.

So this is Talat Hussain’s solution to violence in Karachi? He believes that Gen Kayani should march troops through the streets to ‘clear and hold’ the city of 20 million? Perhaps he suggests drone attacks on Orangi?

The crisis in Karachi is the result of complex economic and demographic issues, not simple law and order problems. Certainly there are gangs and mafias, but these are the symptoms, not the disease. Anyone familiar with the history of politics in the city would know that a PPP government going into Karachi with guns blazing would be like pouring petrol on a flame. The fire would not be quenched, it would grow and spread. The solution to the violence in Karachi lies not in more violence, but in honest analysis and open dialogue between all affected parties to work out a political solution.

In a lame attempt at humour, Talat Hussain concludes his piece by suggesting that “Perhaps in his next speech, President Zardari can offer tutorials to his opponents in the useful skill of how not to govern”. And in this, Talat Hussain has clearly offered a tutorial on how to not to write critical analysis.

Though only two paragraphs, the editorial in question describes the situation in harsh terms several times. It is termed as “Washington’s punitive move to withhold military assistance”, “hitting back”, an attempt to “bully Pakistan into submission”, and “punitive actions”.

But is this really a case of US attempting to “bully Pakistan into submission”?

According to Pentagon spokesman Marine Corps Col. Dave Lapan, the funds are tied to training programs that have been suspended.

Equipment aid the United States is withholding is “directly tied to those decisions by the Pakistani military to curtail training and to not grant visas for some of the U.S. personnel that we need to get in,” Lapan said. “If those things change, then this aid will change as well.”

This was confirmed by the Foreign Office. Minister of State for Foreign Affairs Hina Rabbani Khar told Dawn that “The $500 million cut in US aid to Pakistan is due to the drop in US trainers in Pakistan”.

Therefore the aid in question is on hold because the trainings are on hold. Now we must ask, why are the trainings on hold? Is this another sign of America abandoning Pakistan? Actually quite the opposite. The trainings are on hold because Army kicked the American trainers out.

Gen Kayani, confirmed American military trainers had been kicked out of Pakistan in retaliation at the American raid and said intelligence sharing had been curtailed.

Let us consider the confirmation of COAS Gen Kayani with that of the American military spokesman Col Lapan. If Pakistan kicked the American trainers out, but the Americans say that they will come back if re-invited then this cannot be abandoning Pakistan.

It should also be asked that if the US is punishing Pakistan, why did Deputy Secretary of State Thomas Nides telephone Minister for Finance Dr Abdul Hafeez Shaikh to assure the Minister that the Americans are committed to providing economic assistance to Pakistan?

At the State Department, spokesman Toner told reporters that Deputy Secretary of State Thomas Nides telephoned the Pakistani finance minister earlier on Thursday and discussed with him the importance of continuing cooperation on the US-Pakistan civilian assistance programme.

“Deputy Secretary Nides reiterated to Minister Shaikh that the United States remains committed to working in partnership with Pakistan to fuel economic growth and to improve its energy, education and health sectors,” the spokesman said.

Mr Toner noted that since the passage of the Kerry-Lugar-Berman, the US had dispersed about $2 billion in civilian assistance, which included over $550 million in emergency humanitarian assistance during the floods.

“We do have a slowdown on the security side, but our civilian assistance remains undeterred,” he said.

“The crux of the conversation was about the continuing flow of civilian assistance and how best to ensure that that meets Pakistan’s needs.”

DG ISI Pasha is presently in Washington to hold talks at the highest levels with his American counterparts. There are real issues that must be discussed and worked out between Pakistan and the US to promote each countries interests. When media mischaracterises actions such as withholding of aid, it makes it more difficult for officials on both sides to overcome suspicion and see the other side’s point of view.