LAHORE: A Pakistani journalist under scrutiny for anti-government social media posts was beaten and seized outside his home on Saturday, his son said, in the latest sign of pressure on media.
Rizwan Razi, who worked for private Din TV in the city of Lahore, was being investigated for “defamatory and obnoxious” comments about the judiciary, government and intelligence services, according to Pakistan’s law enforcement agency.
However, there was no official confirmation he had been arrested.
“My father went out of home to see off friends,” his son Osama told Reuters of the incident on Saturday morning.
“When the friends left, unknown persons, riding a black Honda Civic car, thrashed and dragged him in the car and fled away ... I ran after the car but could not do anything.”
Pakistani journalists say they face an increasingly hostile climate since the vote last year that saw Prime Minister Imran Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) take power.
A report from the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA), dated Saturday and seen by Reuters, said Razi had previously been questioned about his Twitter comments. It said authorization had been granted to register a case against him.
His account @RaziDada appeared to be offline on Saturday.
FIA officials in Lahore referred questions to the main office in Islamabad, where officials could not be reached.
Khan’s government replaced the party of ousted former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, who was at odds with the powerful military and is currently serving a seven-year prison sentence for corruption.
The increased official pressure has come at a difficult time for the media in general as advertising revenues have plunged and newsroom budgets been slashed.
Government officials say Pakistan has an independent media and the military denies pressuring journalists.
In a separate case, Ammar Ali Jan, an academic also based in Lahore, was arrested over his involvement in a protest at the death of Arman Loni, a regional leader of the Pashtun Tahaffuz Movement. He was later released on bail.
A message on Ammar’s Facebook page on Saturday said he was taken at 4 a.m. “I am a law-abiding citizen and will not be deterred in the fight for justice,” it said.
Police official Azhar Naveed confirmed the brief detention and bail, which followed other arrests over the protests earlier this week. He said Ammar was charged with taking part in a rally, blocking a road and making “anti-state” speeches.
Pakistani journalist critical of government seized outside home
Pakistani journalist critical of government seized outside home
- Pakistani journalists say they face an increasingly hostile climate since the vote last year that saw Prime Minister Imran Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) take power
- Government officials say Pakistan has an independent media and the military denies pressuring journalists
Semafor targets Gulf expansion after first profitable year
- Digital news brand generates $2m in earnings on $40m of revenue in 2025, and raises $30m in new financing
- Platform aims to be the ‘business and financial news brand of record for the Gulf,’ CEO says, and to ‘blanket the world’ within 2 years
DUBAI: Digital news platform Semafor generated $2 million in earnings in 2025 before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization, on revenue of $40 million, marking its first year of profitability.
It also closed $30 million in new financing, which it plans to use to grow its editorial operations and live events business.
These achievements are particularly notable at a time when the global news industry is facing declining revenues and the erosion of audience trust, the company said.
Justin B. Smith, the company’s co-founder and CEO, told Arab News that Semafor’s model and approach is distinguished by several factors, which can be encapsulated by its vision of building a news product to “serve consumers that are increasingly not trusting news, but also designed with a business model that could deliver sustainable economic advantage.”
Following its first profitable year and armed with new funding, Semafor, founded in 2022, now plans an accelerated phase of global expansion with a focus on scaling editorial output and global convenings.
The company said it will broaden its publication schedule in the year ahead. Semafor Gulf and Semafor Business will become daily publications as the platform increases the frequency of its “first-read” services, which are daily briefings designed to showcase “front page” news and intended to serve as the “first read” for audiences, Smith said.
The Gulf edition of Semafor launched in September 2024, with former Dow Jones reporter Mohammed Sergie as editor. In 2025 Matthew Martin was appointed its Saudi Arabia bureau chief.
Semafor’s brand slogan is “intelligence for the new world economy” and “the Gulf is the epicenter of the new world economy,” Smith said. Currently, its Gulf operation employs eight journalists, based in the UAE and Saudi Arabia, and as it moves to a daily publishing schedule it plans to significantly bolster its editorial team, both in existing markets and new ones, such as Qatar.
Semafor is “obsessed with the business, financial and economic story” in the region and aims to become “the business and financial news brand of record for the Gulf,” Smith said.
In the US, Semafor DC, currently published daily, will move to a twice-a-day format in March. In addition, the company’s flagship annual Semafor World Economy platform in Washington will expand this year from a three-day event to five days, with extended programming. The event, in April, is expected to attract more than 400 global CEOs, more than double the number that took part in 2025.
In addition to the US and the Gulf, Semafor currently operates in Africa. It held its first event in the Gulf region last month, during Abu Dhabi Finance Week, and said it is now looking to grow its events footprint across the Gulf, and into Asia. It will launch a China edition next month, its first foray into Asia, and plans to launch in Europe in 2027, followed eventually by Latin America.
Within the next two years, Semafor aims to have “blanketed the whole world” and become a mature, global intelligence and news brand competing with the “greatest legacy business and financial news brands in the world,” Smith said.
“Our goal is to become the leading global intelligence and news company for the world, founded on independent, high-quality content and convenings,” he added.
