ISLAMABAD: Like other parts of the globe, World Press Freedom Day was observed across Pakistan on Sunday with an aim to encourage and develop press freedom initiatives and spur assessments of the state of press freedom. On the day, the journalist organizations arranged different seminars, conferences , walks and several other programmes, highlighting the importance of freedom of press and role of media and its responsibilities.

The Press Freedom Day was first introduced by the United Nations on May 3, 1991 to highlight the basic principles of press freedom. During the conferences and seminars the participants acknowledged services of those journalists, who have rendered their lives in the line of duty.

On the occasion, the journalists from print and electronic media and representatives of civil society also spoke and highlighted significance of the Day. The Day has also focus on the potential of media in fostering dialogue, mutual understanding and reconciliation.

UNESCO also marks World Press Freedom Day each year by bringing together media professionals, press freedom organizations and UN agencies to assess the state of press freedom worldwide and discuss solutions for addressing challenges. In his message on World Press Freedom Day 2009, the Director-General of UNESCO, Kochiro Matsuura, stressed: “We must strengthen our efforts to build a media that is critical of inherited assumptions yet tolerant of alternative perspectives; a media that brings competing narratives into a shared story of interdependence; a media that responds to diversity through dialogue.”-APP

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