The law targets anyone who “intentionally disseminates” information online that they have “reason to believe to be false or fake and likely to cause or create a sense of fear, panic or disorder or unrest”. Image for representation
| Photo Credit: Getty Images/iStockphoto

Pakistan criminalised online disinformation on Tuesday (January 28, 2025), passing legislation that enshrines punishments of up to three years in prison, a decision journalists say is designed to crack down on dissent.

The law targets anyone who “intentionally disseminates” information online that they have “reason to believe to be false or fake and likely to cause or create a sense of fear, panic or disorder or unrest”.

The law was rushed through the National Assembly with little warning last week before being approved by the Senate on Tuesday (January 28, 2025) as journalists walked out of the gallery in protest.

Senior journalist Asif Bashir Chaudhry, a member of the Pakistan Federal Union of Journalists, told AFP the government had assured reporters they would be consulted but said they were “betrayed and backstabbed”.

“We genuinely wanted a law against misinformation, but if it’s not being done through open discussion but rather through fear and coercion, we will challenge it on every available platform,” Mr. Chaudhry said.

“Even under dictatorships, legislation was not forcefully rammed through parliament the way this government is doing now.”

The bill will now be passed to the president to be rubber-stamped.

Analysts say the government is struggling with legitimacy after an election plagued with rigging allegations and with Pakistan’s most popular politician, former Prime Minister Imran Khan, in jail on a slew of corruption charges his party says are politically motivated.

Khan’s supporters and senior leaders have also faced a severe crackdown, with thousands rounded up.

Social media site X has been shut down in the wake of elections last February, as posts alleging vote tampering spread on the platform.

Khan’s name is censored from television and editors have reported increasing monitoring of their programming.

Senator Syed Shibli Faraz, a member of Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf party, called the new law “highly undemocratic” and said it would “fuel the political victimisation” of their activists.

However, government minister Tanveer Hussain said that the bill would focus on policing social media.

“I am sure that in the future, the anarchy caused in society through social media will be controlled,” he said.

There has been a proliferation of “disinformation” laws, including criminal legislation, worldwide in the past decade enabling governments to control speech online and police “fake news”, according to human rights organisation Article 19.

Such laws can impede journalism, according to the group, which promotes freedom of expression and information globally.

Pakistan’s former PM Imran Khan and his wife Bushra Bibi. File
| Photo Credit: AP

Jailed ex-Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan’s party has submitted a resolution in the Senate calling for the release of the incarcerated leader, his wife Bushra, his close aide, Shah Mahmood Qureshi and other leaders, saying “political vendetta” has destroyed the country’s economy and reputation.

The Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) founder Mr. Khan, 71, and senior party leader and former Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi, 67, have been lodged at the high-security Adiala Jail in Rawalpindi in various cases.

Submitted by party Senator Falak Naz Chitrali, the resolution calls for the release of the PTI party leaders, alleging that they were convicted under “false cases”, the Dawn newspaper reported.

“Political vendetta has destroyed the country’s economy and reputation,” the resolution read.

It also called for the release of PTI stalwart Dr. Yasmin Rashid, Mr. Khan’s wife Ms. Bushra Bibi and other women leaders of the party, as well as journalists.

The party submitted a similar resolution in the National Assembly on March 5.

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Last month, Mr. Khan and his wife, Ms. Bushra Bibi, were sentenced to seven years imprisonment in an “un-Islamic” marriage or Iddat case.

In January, the PTI founding chairman and his wife were sentenced to 14 years imprisonment each for corruption on charges of illegally selling state gifts.

Earlier, the former-cricketer-turned-politician was also sentenced to 10 years in prison by a special court for leaking sensitive state secrets.

Mr. Khan and Mr. Qureshi were also handed down a jail term of 10 years in the cipher case.

The cipher case pertains to a piece of paper, purported to be a diplomatic cable — the cipher — that Mr. Khan had waved at a public rally on March 27, 2022, and naming the U.S., had claimed that it was ‘evidence’ of an “international conspiracy” to topple his government.

The Federal Investigation Agency filed the case against Mr. Khan and Mr. Qureshi on August 15 last year, which accused both of violating the secrecy laws while handling the cable sent by the Pakistan embassy in Washington in March 2022. Mr. Khan and Mr. Qureshi have also been barred from politics for five years.

Dozens of cases have been registered against Mr. Khan since his government was toppled through a no-trust vote in April 2022.