36 বাংলাদেশের স্বাধীনতা যুদ্ধ দলিলপত্র : সপ্তম খণ্ড শিরোনাম সূত্র তারিখ Σ ΦΙ जिन्नन्त्रज्ञानिकनबिड ওয়াশিংটন পাকিস্তান দূতাবাসের দলিলপত্র ১৪ এপ্রিল, ১৯৭১ দূতাবাসের ফাস্ট সেক্রেটারীর চিঠি EMBASSY OF PAKISTAN 2315 Massachusetts Avenue NW WASHINGTON D.C. 20008 April 14, 1971 My dear Senator Harris, We have seen your statement in the Senate published in the Congressional Record of April 1, 1971. We regret that you did not give us an opportunity to discuss the matter before you made the statement as we could have helped you at least to establish the facts. However, I hope this letter clears up some points. You have said that the Pakistan Government "cynically expelled foreign journalists" in order to let the soldiers" kill in peace". There was no more cynicism implied in evacuating foreign journalists from Dacca than there was in helping to evacuate American citizens and personnel of the Consulate in that city. By evacuating them we them we hoped to get them out of possible harms way. In a message to the New York Times and the Evening Star, the Ambassador of Pakistan told their Managing Editors just that. The Ambassador said our administration felt that it could not take the risk of allowing foreign journalists to be involved in the physical dangers inherent in the situation that prevailed that week when the Yahya-Mujib talks broke down and the military was asked to rid the city of Dacca from the armed gangs that roamed in it for many days and were terrorizing the thousands of law abiding citizens (especially the non-Bengalis) with pillage and murder. There could have been no question of the military authorities in Dacca allowing foreign pressmen to move about the city at that time to perform their functions however legitimate. Armed resistance to the restoration of Government's authority was fully expected and did materialize. While this was the basic motive, allow me to bring to your attention one aspect of the problem which may have escaped you. Despite our repeated requests for many years, no American newspaper has chosen to base its correspondent in Pakistan. We are, therefore, never able to get American pressmen to hear us let alone understand our point of view. On the other hand, all the correspondents are based in New Delhi and you will concede that country has not expressed very much love for us either in the past or the present. Newspapermen, we feel are human and in time they begin to reflect views which they hear all around them all the time. Take the pertinent example of press coverage during the November cyclone in East Pakistan last year. The foreign press did not present our views at all. It sought blatant sensationalism rather than the facts of the story. No one ever cared to mention how soon we had got down to work despite the terrific odds. No one recorded that the administration of the entire state government of East Pakistan with the exception of one single West Pakistani (the governor was in the hands of East Pakistanis
