Coverage of Terrorism Issues in Minorities’ Press of Pakistan

Abstract

The 9/11 incident changed the world’s situation when US declared the war against terrorism; this incident united the western forces to fight against the terrorism at global level. Pakistan being the neighborhood to the centre point of the Terrorists was involved in this war against terrorism by the United States. Earlier the media as a whole protested against the involvement of Pakistan in the war. The Minorities’ Press also criticized and protested Pakistan’s involvement in the war on terror but with the passage of time media started favoring the state policy as the major cities of the country were targeted by the terrorists. The present study is focused on the role of the Minorities’ Press in Pakistan in covering the terrorism issue from September 2001 to December 2006. The Minorities’ Press includes the newspapers and magazines of Christians, Ahmedi’s (Qadianis), Hindu religion, Parsi religion and Bhai’s religion. The theoretical framework refers to the Agenda Setting Theory as the study intends to gauge the ‘Media Agenda’ of the minorities in Pakistan. The content analysis method was used to analyze the contents of the editorials and articles of the selected Minorities’ Press. The findings showed that overall the Minorities’ Press supported the government’s policy on war against terrorism and the Christian press was seen more active in this regard as compared to the rest of the newspapers and magazines of the minorities.

Keywords: minorities’ press, terrorism, newspapers, magazines, war on terror