In Nepal’s latest attempt to silence online speech, police are trying to arrest a well-known journalist who published on his YouTube channel claims about the business interests of a leading political family.
Dil Bhushan Pathak reported three weeks ago about the alleged investments of a member of a political family. Kathmandu’s district court issued an arrest warrant for him on June 11 following a complaint by the family to the Cyber Bureau of Nepal Police.
On June 16, the Patan high court issued a temporary order that Pathak should not be arrested, but on June 17 police issued a fresh summons to Pathak in apparent disregard of the court order. At the time of writing this dispatch, police had not been able to locate Pathak.
Pathak is being sought under Nepal’s Electronic Transactions Act, a law which is purportedly designed to regulate online transactions, but which has previously been used to arrest people in relation to online speech. On the same day that the district court issued the arrest warrant it also used the same law to order two news sites to remove stories referring to the Securities and Exchange Board of Nepal.
Last week, a government minister reportedly telephoned the director of a separate media company and threatened that to “take action to bring [the company] down” if it did not remove reporting of Pathak’s case from its website. The minister has denied the allegation
While Nepali authorities have sometimes sought to silence traditional newspapers and broadcasters, most recent cases relate to social media and online news portals. Last year, police used cybercrimes charges to arrest at least two people who had posted photos or videos critical of political leaders. “Whenever someone raises questions about a public figure in Nepal, there is a tendency to file a cybercrime case without any investigation,” former Supreme Court Justice Balram KC told the Nepali Times.
Earlier this year, Nepal’s parliament adopted a controversial new Media Council Act, which empowers the government to appoint the head of a new media regulator. Press freedom advocates have also expressed concern at a proposed new law that would create vague, new criminal offences related to social media, punishable with jail terms of up to five years and fines up to NRs1.5 million (US$10,800).
The Nepal Police should withdraw the arrest warrant against Dil Bhushan Pathak and the government should stop trying to silence journalists and other Nepalis.
