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Head of Amnesty International raises concern about the arrest of Kailash Sirohiya

‘The charges on citizenship ground need to be investigated but those charges do not require for him [Sirohiya] to be in custody,’ Agnès Callamard said.

Kathmandu: Amnesty International’s Secretary General, Agnès Callamard, raised concern about the arrest of Kailash Sirohiya, the chairperson of Kantipur Media Group, and said that he should not have been detained.

Speaking at a program in Kathmandu on Friday, Callamard said that the arrest of Sirohiya has “sent alarm to me.” “The charges on citizenship ground need to be investigated but those charges do not require for him to be in custody,” she said, adding that he should not have been detained and he should be released immediately.” “The fact that he has not been released even though we were promised that he would very shortly does suggest that there may have been an attempt to intimidate him and his colleagues and it may constitute a form of retaliation for the independent reporting that they are doing,” Callamard further said.

“It is unsavory on the part of the authorities to spend so much energy for one individual who committed a crime, if he committed it, is not harming anybody,” said Amnesty International’s Secretary General.

She said that in many parts of Nepal local journalists are being arbitrarily detained and they are being intimidated, creating atmosphere of fear. “When a journalist is silenced, it is the entire society that suffers,” she said.

After Nepal Police arrested Sirohiya on charges of misusing citizenship on Tuesday, political leaders as well as media fraternity have accused the Home Minister Rabi Lamichhane of waging vendetta against KMG chair for reporting the cooperatives fraud scams.