Pakistan

Pakistan ranked 153rd of 180 countries and territories in the 2026 RSF World Press Freedom Index, improving from 158th in 2025 but remaining in the Index’s “very serious” category. RSF continues to describe an environment in which civilian and military authorities seek to control, restrict and sometimes suppress journalistic content.

Pakistan’s institutional balance shifted further towards executive authority during the review period. The Human Rights Commission of Pakistan’s report on 2025 records a marked deterioration in judicial independence following the 27th Constitutional Amendment, adopted in November 2025, which reconfigured the higher judiciary and expanded executive influence over judicial appointments. HRCP separately raises concerns about court decisions permitting the military trial of civilians. It describes a severe contraction of civic space in which the right to question authority was deeply suppressed and identifies amendments to the Prevention of Electronic Crimes Act, together with sedition and anti-terrorism laws, as instruments used against journalists, activists, political workers and lawyers. Amendments to anti-terrorism legislation at federal and Balochistan levels permit detention for up to three months without charge or ordinary judicial oversight.

The Prevention of Electronic Crimes Act was amended in January 2025. A new Section 26A criminalised the intentional dissemination of information that a person knows or believes to be false or fake and that is likely to cause fear, panic, disorder or unrest. The offence carries a maximum penalty of three years’ imprisonment, a fine of PKR 2 million, or both. Pakistani press organisations argued that the provisions were deliberately vague and vulnerable to political abuse. The International Federation of Journalists and the Pakistan Federal Union of Journalists demanded their repeal, while journalists held protests across the country against what they regarded as an attempt to silence the press.

Enforcement has been extensive. Human Rights Watch records approximately 689 PECA cases between January and August 2025, many involving journalists and political commentators. It also reports signal disruptions affecting critical television channels during broadcasts of opposition rallies and the killing of at least three journalists during the year. The Pakistan Press Foundation documented 233 instances of violence, threats, legal action, censorship, connectivity disruption and related pressure affecting journalists and media organisations between January 2025 and April 2026.

Freedom Network documented 129 verified press-freedom violations between April 2025 and March 2026, including two killings, five death threats, 16 physical assaults, two kidnappings or enforced disappearances and 58 legal cases, most of them brought under PECA. Enforcement by the National Cyber Crime Investigation Agency continued in 2026. Journalist Sohrab Barkat, detained since November 2025, was granted bail in February; Fakharur Rehman was arrested in a PECA case and released on bail in April; and Barkat was arrested again over his reporting in June before once more obtaining bail.

The State Media Monitor maps three state-media organisations in Pakistan, all within the portfolio of the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting and all classified State-Controlled (SC):

• Pakistan Broadcasting Corporation, the federal state radio broadcaster. Its governing Act requires it, as far as possible, to provide factual, accurate and impartial news, while also empowering the federal government to direct the general pattern and policies of its programmes, announcements and news and to determine conclusively what constitutes a policy matter.
• Pakistan Television Corporation, the federal state television broadcaster, reclassified in 2026 from Captured Public/State-Managed after the abolition of its electricity-bill licence fee and the approval of a PKR 11 billion federal support package for FY2025–26. An initial PKR 3.813 billion was authorised, with the balance to be provided through quarterly releases for salaries, pensions and operating expenses.
• Associated Press of Pakistan, the federal news agency. Amendments enacted in March 2026 transferred appointment of its Managing Director to the Prime Minister and confirmed the supervising ministry’s power to instruct APP concerning the policies governing the announcements, news and views it distributes.

The three organisations are institutionally interlocked rather than operating as entirely parallel bodies. The Managing Director of PTV holds an ex-officio seat on PBC’s board. The Managing Director of PTV and the Director General of PBC both sit on APP’s board, which is chaired by the Secretary of the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting. PBC’s board also includes a permanent ex-officio seat for the Director General of Inter-Services Public Relations, the media directorate of the Pakistan Armed Forces. SMM’s review found no equivalent statutory board seat for a military media directorate among the other South Asian state broadcasters in its dataset.

Restrictions on opposition visibility were also evident in state and parliamentary broadcasting. In January 2025, members of the Senate Standing Committee on Information and Broadcasting criticised the blackout of opposition speeches on state television. Ambreen Jan, then serving simultaneously as Information Secretary and PTV Managing Director, said the omission might have resulted from a technical fault.

Media profiles