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Pakistan expels U.S. researcher

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan expelled an American researcher affiliated to a Foreign Ministry think-tank here days after an article by him on the Taliban appeared in the New York Times magazine.

The New York-based Committee for the Protection of Journalists (CPJ) condemned the expulsion of Nicholas Schmidle, a fellow of the Institute of Current World Affairs and locally affiliated to the Institute of Strategic Studies as “harassment of journalists”.

But the government said it had not expelled anyone with a journalist visa.

Mr. Schmidle’s article headlined “Next-Gen Taliban” appeared in the Sunday magazine of the respected New York Times. The article was based on numerous interviews with Taliban leaders in Balochistan and in the North-West Frontier Province, including Swat Valley, which saw a recent military operation against Islamist militants led by Maulana Fazlullah.

In a statement, the CPJ said it was “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”.

CPJ executive director Joel Simon said “at a time of growing crisis in Pakistan, perhaps the worst tactic for promoting calm is for the government to silence the press.”

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

A statement from the government said no American journalist was been expelled from Pakistan.

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