journalists
JPC condemns BFIU as it seeks bank account details of 11 journalists
The Jatiya Press Club (JPC) on Wednesday strongly denounced Bangladesh Financial Intelligence Unit (BFIU) for seeking bank account details of 11 journalist leaders, and said it has tarnished the image of the journalist community.
In an emergency meeting, the JPC managing committee demanded the BFIU immediately withdraw such a “disgraceful decision”, said a press release signed by JPC Joint Secretary Mainul Alam.
“Under the existing law, allegations against an individual can be investigated. But there’re enough reasons to consider it a motivated decision since the letters were issued in the names of the elected top leaders of all organisations of only a particular profession (seeking their account details),” said the JPC meeting.
Read: JPC strongly condemns Israeli brutality, airstrike targeting media houses
Voicing surprise over the BFIU move, the meeting said, “The image of the journalist community has been tarnished with the seeking of bank account details of its leaders in a wholesale manner. Even a national institution like the Jatiya Press Club has been put into question in an unprecedented way.”
It also said the elected journalist leaders have been publicly humiliated and their social status has been tarnished.
The BFIU of the Bangladesh Bank issued letters to the commercial banks asking for details of bank accounts of 11 journalist leaders last week.
Launch movement for revoking DSA, Fakhrul urges journalists
BNP Secretary General Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir on Sunday urged journalists and professionals to launch a strong movement against all ‘repressive laws’, including the Digital Security Act.
“The media in Bangladesh have taken a different character. If you look at the print and electric media, you will find them in a sorry state. One or two newspapers who used to write freely, don’t dare doing that now,” he said.
The BNP leader also said the government has created a terrible situation with various ‘oppressive’ laws to suppress journalists and gag the media. “Let’s launch a movement to repeal all the repressive laws and the Digital Security Act.”
Also read: Govt keeping media busy with ‘dramas to hide failures’: BNP
He made the remarks at a discussion organised by Ruhul Amin Gazi Mukti Parishad demanding the release of the journalist leader at Jatiya Press Club.
Police arrested Ruhul Amin Gazi, president of a faction of Bangladesh Federal Union of Journalists (BFUJ), under the DSA on October 21 last year.
Fakhrul suggested that journalists hold a convention in Dhaka demanding the release of Ruhul Amin Ghazi alongside intensifying the movement to have him freed.
He bemoaned that a group of journalists and the media owners have been desperately flattering the government to get its shelter and blessings. “This is the current situation of the country. It hurts me.”
The BNP leader said the government has taken a stance against people, independence and the constitution to turn the country into a truly failed state. “The current government has become a subservient and puppet one. So, people have now no freedom of speech and independence.”
He also alleged that the government is snatching people’s freedom of speech by procuring telephone-hacking tools from Israel.
Also read: Kamal demands abolition of DSA
"One thing we have to keep in mind is that there’s no alternative to a mass upsurge uniting people to get rid of the current situation of the country. We don't have weapons and we also don’t believe in armed struggle. We want to achieve the victory together with people,” the BNP leader added.
Fakhrul accused the government of politicising all state and democratic institutions. “Awami League is a party that never believed in democracy. This is the party that established the one-party Baksal rule in 1975 by banning all the parties and shutting down all the newspapers.”
He also said the government has failed to deliver on all fronts as it is focusing only on ‘corruption and plundering’ public money.
Speaking at the programme, Nagorik Oikya convener Mahmudur Rahman Manna urged BNP leaders and activists to continue a movement against the current regime. “It may not take a long time to ensure the fall of this regime,” he said.
He said the government’s weaknesses and its problems with police and administrations are getting exposed before people. “Anger against the government has been prevailing everywhere. They (govt) are losing grounds beneath their feet. No one will be able to resist the fall of this regime.”
Brac pulling foreign staff, inc. 12 Bangladeshis, out of Afghanistan
Brac International is relocating its Bangladeshi staff from Afghanistan to ensure their safety and security amid fears that the Taliban will roll back two decades of gains by women and ethnic minorities while restricting the work of journalists and NGO workers.
Around 3,000 Brac staff work across ten provinces of the landlocked South Asian country. Of them, 14 expatriates including 12 Bangladeshis are being returned to their countries as panic takes hold in Afghanistan, according to the INGO.
Read: Canada joins hands with Brac to support vulnerable people
Five of them, including three Bangladeshis, were already on leave outside Afghanistan and have been asked not to return.
Three of the remaining nine Bangladeshis left Afghanistan Friday and others are scheduled to leave by August 22.
Brac has taken steps to ensure the highest security of its staff in the face of growing violence in Afghanistan since the start of the formal withdrawal of international troops, according to Brac International Executive Director Shameran Abed.
Read: BRAC partners with govt’s Covid-19 vaccination drive
The organisation has been working in Afghanistan for more than 19 years, providing services including education, healthcare, community development, Covid-19 related support, humanitarian and food security assistance.
In the past, several Brac staff were abducted in Afghanistan and were released after negotiations.
Afghans watch with growing fear as the Taliban overrun most of the country while international forces withdraw.
Read:One-third of female employed youths jobless as impact of Covid-19: BRAC
Afghanistan's President Ashraf Ghani flew out of the country Sunday, joining thousands of his fellow citizens and foreigners in a stampede fleeing the advancing Taliban and "signalling the end of a 20-year Western experiment aimed at remaking the country."
Meanwhile, officials said Bangladesh is keeping close tabs on the fast-changing situation in Afghanistan.
Probe: Journalists, activists among firm’s spyware targets
An investigation by a global media consortium based on leaked targeting data provides further evidence that military-grade malware from Israel-based NSO Group, the world’s most infamous hacker-for-hire outfit, is being used to spy on journalists, human rights activists and political dissidents.
From a list of more than 50,000 cellphone numbers obtained by the Paris-based journalism nonprofit Forbidden Stories and the human rights group Amnesty International and shared with 16 news organizations, journalists were able to identify more than 1,000 individuals in 50 countries who were allegedly selected by NSO clients for potential surveillance.
They include 189 journalists, more than 600 politicians and government officials, at least 65 business executives, 85 human rights activists and several heads of state, according to The Washington Post, a consortium member. The journalists work for organizations including The Associated Press, Reuters, CNN, The Wall Street Journal, Le Monde and The Financial Times.
Amnesty also reported that its forensic researchers had determined that NSO Group’s flagship Pegasus spyware was successfully installed on the phone of Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi’s fiancee, Hatice Cengiz, just four days after he was killed in the Saudi Consulate in Istanbul in 2018. The company had previously been implicated in other spying on Khashoggi.
Read: CJA shocked at killing of photojournalist Danish Siddiqui
NSO Group denied in an emailed response to AP questions that it has ever maintained “a list of potential, past or existing targets.” In a separate statement, it called the Forbidden Stories report “full of wrong assumptions and uncorroborated theories.”
The company reiterated its claims that it only sells to “vetted government agencies” for use against terrorists and major criminals and that it has no visibility into its customers’ data. Critics call those claims dishonest — and have provided evidence that NSO directly manages the high-tech spying. They say the repeated abuse of Pegasus spyware highlights the nearly complete lack of regulation of the private global surveillance industry.
The source of the leak — and how it was authenticated -- was not disclosed. While a phone number’s presence in the data does not mean an attempt was made to hack a device, the consortium said it believed the data indicated potential targets of NSO’s government clients. The Post said it identified 37 hacked smartphones on the list. The Guardian, another consortium member, reported that Amnesty had found traces of Pegasus infections on the cellphones of 15 journalists who let their phones be examined after discovering their number was in the leaked data.
The most numbers on the list, 15,000, were for Mexican phones, with a large share in the Middle East. NSO Group’s spyware has been implicated in targeted surveillance chiefly in the Middle East and Mexico. Saudi Arabia is reported to be among NSO clients. Also on the lists were phones in countries including France, Hungary, India, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan and Pakistan.
“The number of journalists identified as targets vividly illustrates how Pegasus is used as a tool to intimidate critical media. It is about controlling public narrative, resisting scrutiny, and suppressing any dissenting voice,” Amnesty quoted its secretary-general, Agnes Callamard, as saying.
In one case highlighted by the Guardian, Mexican reporter Cecilio Pineda Birto was assassinated in 2017 a few weeks after his cell phone number appeared on the leaked list.
AP’s director of media relations, Lauren Easton, said the company is “deeply troubled to learn that two AP journalists, along with journalists from many news organizations” are on the list of the 1,000 potential targets for Pegasus infection. She said the AP was investigating to try to determine if its two staffers’ devices were compromised by the spyware.
The consortium’s findings build on extensive work by cybersecurity researchers, primarily from the University of Toronto-based watchdog Citizen Lab. NSO targets identified by researchers beginning in 2016 include dozens of Al-Jazeera journalists and executives, New York Times Beirut bureau chief Ben Hubbard, Moroccan journalist and activist Omar Radi and prominent Mexican anti-corruption reporter Carmen Aristegui. Her phone number was on the list, the Post reported. The Times said Hubbard and its former Mexico City bureau chief, Azam Ahmed, were on the list.
Two Hungarian investigative journalists, Andras Szabo and Szabolcs Panyi, were among journalists on the list whose phones were successfully infected with Pegasus, the Guardian reported.
Among more than two dozen previously documented Mexican targets are proponents of a soda tax, opposition politicians, human rights activists investigating a mass disappearance and the widow of a slain journalist. In the Middle East, the victims have mostly been journalists and dissidents, allegedly targeted by the Saudi and United Arab Emirates governments.
Read:Gaza-based journalists in Hamas chat blocked from WhatsApp
The consortium’s “Pegasus Project” reporting bolsters accusations that not just autocratic regimes but democratic governments, including India and Mexico, have used NSO Group’s Pegasus spyware for political ends. Its members, who include Le Monde and Sueddeutsche Zeitung of Germany, are promising a series of stories based on the leak.
Pegasus infiltrates phones to vacuum up personal and location data and surreptitiously control the smartphone’s microphones and cameras. In the case of journalists, that lets hackers spy on reporters’ communications with sources.
The program is designed to bypass detection and mask its activity. NSO Group’s methods to infect its victims have grown so sophisticated that researchers say it can now do so without any user interaction, the so-called “zero-click” option.
In 2019, WhatsApp and its parent company Facebook sued NSO Group in U.S. federal court in San Francisco, accusing it of exploiting a flaw in the popular encrypted messaging service to target — with missed calls alone — some 1,400 users. NSO Group denies the accusations.
The Israeli company was sued the previous year in Israel and Cyprus, both countries from which it exports products. The plaintiffs include Al-Jazeera journalists, as well as other Qatari, Mexican and Saudi journalists and activists who say the company’s spyware was used to hack them.
Several of the suits draw heavily on leaked material provided to Abdullah Al-Athbah, editor of the Qatari newspaper Al-Arab and one of the alleged victims. The material appears to show officials in the United Arab Emirates discussing whether to hack into the phones of senior figures in Saudi Arabia and Qatar, including members of the Qatari royal family.
NSO Group does not disclose its clients and says it sells its technology to Israeli-approved governments to help them target terrorists and break up pedophile rings and sex- and drug-trafficking rings. It claims its software has helped save thousands of lives and denies its technology was in any way associated with Khashoggi’s murder.
NSO Group also denies involvement in elaborate undercover operations uncovered by The AP in 2019 in which shadowy operatives targeted NSO critics including a Citizen Lab researcher to try to discredit them.
Last year, an Israeli court dismissed an Amnesty International lawsuit seeking to strip NSO of its export license, citing insufficient evidence.
NSO Group is far from the only merchant of commercial spyware. But its behavior has drawn the most attention, and critics say that is with good reason.
Read:Journalist Ranjan appointmented 1st Secretary (Press) at Kolkata Mission
Last month, it published its first transparency report, in which it says it has rejected “more than $300 million in sales opportunities as a result of its human rights review processes.” Eva Galperin, director of cybersecurity at the Electronic Frontier Foundation and a strident critic, tweeted: “If this report was printed, it would not be worth the paper it was printed on.”
A new, interactive online data platform created by the group Forensic Architecture with support from Citizen Lab and Amnesty International catalogs NSO Group’s activities by country and target. The group partnered with filmmaker Laura Poitras, best known for her 2014 documentary “Citzenfour” about NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden, who offers video narrations.
“Stop what you’re doing and read this,” Snowden tweeted Sunday, referencing the consortium’s findings. “This leak is going to be the story of the year.”
Since 2019, the U.K. private equity firm Novalpina Capital has controlled a majority stake in NSO Group. Earlier this year, Israeli media reported the company was considering an initial public offering, most likely on the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange.
3 journos sued under DSA in Thakurgaon, one held
A case has been filed against three journalists under the Digital Security Act for publishing reports in the online versions of their media organizations over alleged irregularities in Thakugaon Modern Sadar Hospital.
Dr Nadirul Aziz, supervisor of Thakurgaon Modern Sadar Hospital, filed the case against the trio with Sadar Police Station on July 9 for publishing the reports, said its officer-in-charge Tanvirul Islam.
Read: Hefazat violence in Brahmanbaria: DSA Case filed
The accused are Tanvir Hasan Tanu, Thakurgaon district correspondent of Daily Ittefaq, Jago News24 and Independent TV, Abdul Latif Litu, district correspondent of Bangladesh Protidin and Rahim Shuvho, district correspondent of Newsbangla24.com.
4 journalists receive Dhaka Ahsania Mission anti-tobacco fellowship award
Four journalists have received fellowship awards in anti-tobacco journalism from Dhaka Ahsania Mission.
The names of the journalists – Masud Rumee (Kaler Kantho), Dolar Mehedi (71 TV), Jannatul Ferdous Panna (Amader Natun Somoy) and Md Akhtaruzzaman (Amader Orthoniti) – were announced at a virtual event Wednesday.
Lead Policy Advisor of Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids Bangladesh Md Mostafizur Rahman presided over the programme.
Also read: Speakers for amending Smoking and Tobacco Usage (Control) Act
Secretary of the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting Md Mokbul Hossain was the chief guest and Zafar Wazed, director general of the Press Institute of Bangladesh, was a special guest at the ceremony.
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AL general secretary seeks cordial relation with the media
Awami League General Secretary Obaidul Quader on Tuesday said he does not want to see any hostility between the government and the media.
“I don’t want any confrontation and I want to see a cordial relations with the media," Quader said in reply to a question after a meeting with a group of journalist leaders at the Secretariat.
Quader, who doubles as Road Transport and Bridges Minister, said he met the leaders in his capacity as the general secretary of the ruling party.
He said the leaders raised with him some issues regarding the newspaper industry, withdrawal of a case against journalist Rozina Islam, media rights and some other demands.
Talking about Rozina’s case and other demands Quader, said “A ministry concerned is there to settle the issue. Besides, Information and Broadcasting Ministry, Home Ministry and Law Ministry are there and some special things related to the issues have to be informed to the Prime Minister.”
“They have raised the problems and I will place these to the prime minister,” he said.
Replying to a question whether the case filed against Rozina should be withdrawn; the Minister said “The case is now in the court. We have to discuss the matter with Law minister and others and after an overall consideration and discussion with all I can tell about this.”
Prothom Alo senior reporter Rozina Islam was sent to jail on May 18 in a case filed under the Official Secrets Act and the Penal Code by the Health Ministry.
She was freed from Kashimpur Women's Central Jail on May 23 after a Dhaka court granted her an ad-interim bail until July 15.
Don’t judge Rozina issue emotionally: Info Minister to journalists
Information Minister Dr Hasan Mahmud on Saturday urged journalists to look at the issue of Prothom Alo journalist Rozina Islam from a realistic point of view instead of considering it emotionally.
“Look at Rozina Islam issue from a realistic point of view instead of looking at it emotionally,” he told the leaders of Bangladesh Federal Union of Journalists (BFUJ).
The BJUJ leaders met the minister at his Minto Road residence a day before a Dhaka court’s order on the bail petition of Rozina in a case filed against her under the Official Secrets Act.
Also read: Rozina to get fair judgement: FM tells CNN
BFUJ president Molla Jalal, acting secretary general, Abdul Majid, senior journalist Syed Ishtiaque Reza, Dhaka Union of Journalists’ (DUJ’) joint secretary Khairul Alam, executive member Ibrahim Khalil Khokon and senior journalist Motahar Hossain were, among others, present.
Earlier, the newly-elected committee of Directors Guild, an organisation of television drama directors, met the minister at his residence.
Talking to reporters after the meeting, Dr Hasan alleged that an anti-state quarter is trying to take advantage of the incident involving Prothom Alo journalist Rozina Islam in the Health Ministry on May 17.
Also read: Order on journalist Rozina Islam’s bail Sunday
"The Rozina Islam incident has been politicised as the anti-state quarters have become very active to take advantage of it by capitalising on it,” he said.
The minister said, “No one is above law -- neither a minister and a secretary nor Rozina Islam. We’ve to be careful so that the anti-state elements can’t use any of our activities as a weapon to harm the country."
Besides, he said, various anti-state elements, who conspire against the country and spread false propaganda staying abroad, have also been seen to be very active over the incident.
Also read: Drop all "oppressive charges" against Rozina: HRW
The minister said Khaleda Zia’s former deputy press secretary Mushfiqul Fazal Ansari got a reply from an official on overall media by asking a question at the regular press briefing at the UN Secretary General's Office. “There’s an evil effort to conduct a campaign over that reply that it was the UN’s concern over the Rozina Issue. “The statement of a UN official and the UN’s concern are not the same at all.”
Dr Hasan said he got information on social media about collecting official documents from the Shipping Ministry and Home Ministry by Rozina in the past the same way she did it in the Health Ministry on May 17 and managing work for her husband’s business. “As an investigation is going on, these things will come out.”
About BNP Secretary General Mirza Fakhrul Islam’s comments on the incident, Dr Hasan said as BNP is speaking on the Rozina issue and it is clear that there is an attempt to give it a political colour.
Journalists demand unconditional release of Rozina Islam
Journalists on Wednesday formed a human chain in front of the Jatiya Press Club demanding unconditional release of journalist Rozina Islam and punishment of those involved in harassing her at the Secretariat.
Dhaka Reporters Unity, Bangladesh Federal Union of Journalist, Barishal Divisional Journalist Association, Bangladesh Secretariat Reporters Forum, Bangladesh Photo Journalists Association and other organizations joined the human chain around 11 am.
Read:That's something concerning: UN on Rozina's arrest
They also demanded withdrawal of false case filed against Rozina.
Besides, Dhaka Reporters Unity (DRU) held a protest rally in front of its office demanding the same.
Rozina, senior journalist of Prothom Alo, was handed over to police on Monday night after being held at the Secretariat for over five hours.
Rozina was arrested for allegedly attempting to illegally “collect sensitive government documents and taking photos of them” from the Secretariat on Monday.
An FIR was filed against Rozina under the Official Secrets Act and sections 379 and 411 of The Penal Code on a complaint filed by the Health Services Division at Shahbagh police station.
Read: Journalist Rozina must get justice: Law Minister
Later, a Dhaka court on Tuesday sent Rozina, to jail after rejecting the police's demand for her five-day remand.
Rozina Islam was taken to Kashimpur Central Women's Jail on Tuesday afternoon after a Dhaka court rejected police’s remand plea.
Besides, the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare has formed a three-member probe committee to look into the confinement and later handover to police of journalist Rozina Islam at the Secretariat on Monday.
Journalists boycott Health Ministry’s press briefing
The members of Bangladesh Secretariat Reporters Forum (BSRF) on Tuesday boycotted a press briefing of the Health Ministry protesting the harassment and arrest of Prothom Alo senior reporter Rozina Islam.
The Health Ministry was scheduled to arrange a press briefing around 11 am at the secretariat.
BSRF came up with the announcement on Tuesday morning.
The next progammes will be announced after an emergency meeting over the issue, it said in a press release signed by Shamim Ahmed, general secretary of BSRF.
Read: Senior journo Rozina produced in court
Earlier in the morning, police produced in a court Prothom Alo senior reporter Rozina Islam, who was held in a case under the Official Secrets Act, and sought her custody for five days.
Deputy Commissioner of Dhaka Metropolitan Police (Ramna Division) Sazzadur Rahman said that Rozina was produced before Metropolitan Magistrate Mohammad Jashim around 8 am. He said that the police have sought her remand for custodial interrogation.
Rozina was arrested for allegedly attempting to illegally “collect sensitive government documents and taking photos of them” from the Secretariat on Monday.
The Prothom Alo journalist has rejected all the allegations. "I was, in fact, harassed at the Secretariat," she claimed immediately after her arrest.
An FIR was filed against Rozina under the Official Secrets Act and sections 379 and 411 of The Penal Code on a complaint filed by the Health Services Division at Shahbagh police station, said Harun ur Rashid, additional deputy commissioner (Ramna Division) of Dhaka Metropolitan Police.
Read:Prothom Alo senior reporter Rozina arrested under Official Secrets Act
Rozina was handed over to police around 9.45pm on Monday after being held at the Secretariat for over five hours.
Maidul Islam Pradhan, senior information officer at the Health Ministry, claimed that she had entered the room of the Private Secretary to the Secretary of Health Services Division between 3pm and 3.30pm “without permission”.
“She took photos of sensitive documents. Some of those were recovered from her by the staff of the Health Ministry, including the PS, Additional Secretary of the Ministry and police constable Mizanur Rahman,” he claimed.
Health Secretary Lokman Hossain has refused to comment on the matter.