Abstract

In the aftermath of September 11, Osama Bin Laden has been declared the mastermind of the attacks and al-Qaida and the Taliban has been considered strong outside enemies. In the dusk of 9/11 Global War against Terrorism has been launched by the United States and its allies to counter terrorism in any region and to eradicate extremism from all over the world. Mediated treatment of this un-ended war gives rise to questions that how media prioritize some issues to serve the policy objectives and how media frame events on specific dimensions (Altheide 2007). Pakistan due to its geo-strategic position has attained the status of a front-line state and Pakistani media go hand in hand with mainstream media in War against Terrorism. This study aims to investigate how the Pakistani media frame War on Terror in its editorials toeing foreign policy objectives and international relations of Pakistan with the United States (Abbas 2003).

Key Words

War on Terror, Framing, Editorials, Dawn, The News, Taliban and Osama Bin  Laden

Introduction

Michel Chossudovsky in his book America's War on Terror explains that “in the morning of September 11 Bush administration declared that al-Qaeda attacked the World Trade Center and Osama bin Laden was the main perpetrator. In the dusk of September 11, a meeting of the war cabinet comprising selective members from forces, intelligence and politician have been organized and at the end of this historic White House meeting the war on terror was officially launched without keeping into consideration the intelligence foreknowledge, warnings and forensic investigation of the wreckage. The rest is the history of winners and losers in the context of terrorism and the war against terrorism”.

Osama bin Laden was assumed as the mastermind of the September 11 attacks under the patronage of Afghanistan's Taliban Government and with the prop up of al Qaeda the international organization of Islamic militants. Services of renowned public relations firms with offices in Washington, London and Islamabad have been hired to mould public opinion inside and outside of the United States to wage a global war against terrorism (Douthat, 2011). Media and information apparatus is being used as psychological weapon in this information warfare to win the war against terrorism in the hearts and minds of the public rather than the battlefield. Now the mainstream media design multi-dimensional agendas, framing the incident‘s striking visuals and grieved victims to create a pretext or to justify the Global War against Terrorism.

Frames have been drafted “from the history of the Soviet-Afghan War to compel the public opinion in the controlled pipelines toward selective directions. Secret diplomatic agreements between the winners of Jimmy Carter’s Operation Cyclone i.e. Osama bin Laden, the Saudi intelligence chief Prince Turk al-Faisal and General Zia-ul-Haq are declassified to feed crispy themes in the newsrooms against extremism and religious fundamentalism and to formulate the public opinion in favour of Global War against Terrorism” (Engdahl, 2011).

Power players have a super right to intervene in any state and to interfere in any nation with the catchwords of noble causes i.e. renewal of democracy and public peace and they may bomb away the fabricated opponents for the restoration of peace, propagandizing them as evildoers, terrorists and the Great Satan. The Bush administration and the mainstream media fabricated a mythology of Bin Laden raising him to superman status and frenzy of Islamophobia, generating fear and sensation to launch U.S. military operations as part of the Global War against Terrorism (Fishman, 1980). 

The United States has established its imperialistic control over the 191 Member States of the United Nations. The United States is in command of nearly 737 military bases in 63 countries around the world. All its missile installations and military presence in Central Asia, the Middle East and South Asia are not for military purposes to combat terrorism and extremism only but for dominating the long-standing economic and political interests in the region are also a subject of exploration in the coming centuries (Fahmy, 2007).

After the industrial revolution, everything began to change and the new wealthy elite began to appear composed of inventors, traders, industrialists and bankers. These capitalistic elites install factories, invest in production fields, introduce new products in the marketplace and then launch glamorous advertisements for trade and consumption of their products.1800 to 1945 is the period of colonial and imperial competition between the great powers for more and more colonies (Goffman, 1974). After 1945 under the full spectrum domination of the US military a new model for the growth of capital, cooperative imperialism rather than competitive imperialism was launched and the whole world opened for transnational corporations to steal the wealth of poor nations and line the pockets of capitalist elites and proprietors of transnational corporations (Goodall, 2006).

A famous Kenyan proverb says “When elephants fight it is the grass that suffers, all powerful nations and strong economies in the world have their basic concern with power and profit. South Asian countries due to their geographical location and geopolitical relations remain a battlefield between strategic competitors throughout history. The United States is striving for control in the Middle East and Central Asia to dominate the energy reservoirs in the Gulf region and Caspian Sea basin, and to counter any confrontation with this nuclear region in the coming centuries where China, Russia, India, Pakistan and nuclear ambitious Iran exist”.

This game of “bombs and blood to achieve peace and democracy is not only played on the battlefields of Afghanistan and Iraq only, but since September 11 under the pretext of the Global War against Terrorism, the United States sought war and intervention in Libya, Yemen, Colombia, Sudan and Pakistan to boost up the dominance of the United States and to lining the pockets of Transnational Corporations with the prize of war, the oil and other natural resources”.  

To complete the dream of a New World Order, behind the panorama power players are now on the hunt for new energy resources and new potential markets to sophisticatedly snatch the capital from developing countries to the big economies of the Transnational Corporations and Oil Mafias headed by mysterious Western Group 'the Bilderberg' which comprises the heads of European Bank, The World Bank, IMF, and United Nations (Golan, 2006).

Dr S. M. Rehman in his article `Counter-Insurgency (COIN) using power or prudence` articulates that the USA is not motivated to seize territory but to increase its economy by controlling the oil wealth in the Gulf region, the Central Asian States and the Caspian basin, the rich reservoir of oil and gas. Central Asia is the centre stage for new great games based on oil politics. Western oil giants entered the region in quest of oil and keep their permanent presence in the region for long-standing economic goals. Situating in South Asia, Pakistan is the gateway to Central Asia and provides easy access to the countries of the Middle East by way of the Arabian Sea. Pakistan is a corridor for oil and energy-rich land-locked Central Asian States and a transit trade route with China through Gawador Port and Karakorum Highway. 

Today “we live in the age of information and digitization in which information and technology are interdependent of each other. Media is being used as a psychological weapon and targets are chosen because of their psychological value rather than military value and the warmonger focus on the moral deterioration of the subjects rather than murder and massacre. Information warfare is known as psychological warfare in a broader perspective to distort the opponent's view of reality and to project a false view of things and manipulate the will of the opponent to engage him in hostile activities”.

Western political interference, military intervention and drone attacks will never eradicate terrorism, extremism and militancy from human societies but these interferences shall produce grieved, biased and hateful generations that will ultimately give birth to terrorism at the grassroots level in the coming centuries (Graber, 1980). It is also a troubling question for the modern generations why different ideologies allow the killing of hundreds of thousands of people in the name of peace and democracy and why the historians never condemn the lust of power players and the hunger of warmongers to dominate the world with bomb and blood and why the intellectual property of the nations do not disclose the secret propagandas to wage war against any nation framing them as evildoers and terrorists (Herman & Chomsky 2000).

The aim and scope of this study are to offer insight into the important issue of the Global War against Terrorism by exploring the policy of leading English newspapers of Pakistan exploring the frames used by the newspapers and the slant of the editorial contents will be studied as favourable against or neutral towards the War on Terrorism. This study will emphasize the related topics or categories and how these related topics are treated in editorial content. In this process, the researcher tries to explore the relationship between the overall policy and strategy of Pakistan in the US-led Terrorism War and the role of English newspapers in the public opinion formulation in favour, against or neutral towards the War against Terrorism (Dorman & Farhang 1987). 




Objectives of the Study

This study has been designed to achieve the following objectives:-

a. To analyze the nature and treatment of Pakistan’s leading English newspapers in the War against Terrorism/Extremism.

b. To document the overall strategy and sentiments of Dawn and The News regarding the War on Terrorism in its editorials contents.

c. To provide scientific research that how Pakistan’s leading English newspapers frame issues in accordance with its foreign policy.




Study Related to Terrorism 

The definition of terrorism is beyond the objective of this study and far from the limits of the space available for this thesis but in order to understand the framing of terrorism, a firm grip on the term terrorism and its history is essential to understand for its application throughout this research work (Karim, 2000). 

Especially since U.S. President George W. Bush declared the `War against Terrorism` in reaction to the attacks of September 11 in the United States, the application and understanding of this term as such is problematic because it has become increasingly unclear definition. Even before this recent announcement of the war against terrorism, it has been used for centuries to describe the various acts of violence in society (Kumar, 2006).

Anis Shivani in an article on America's hyper-real war on terrorism articulates that this is not so much a war against terrorism but a preventive strike against domestic resistance and worldwide confrontation to the hegemony of transnational corporations in the early years of the twenty-first century. Shivani further added that on the other hand, things were going out of control. Anti-globalization sentiments were spreading all around like a virus. The Senate was lost by the Republicans, and a generalized resentment was taking hold against the hegemony of transnational corporations in the most corrupt political system on earth.

In the “Middle East, Balkans, and Western Asia, the US will continue the process of turning much of the region into an occupied imperialist realm, as we now see in Kosovo. Afghanistan occupies a very strategic geopolitical position and military bases there will be significant in the coming confrontation with grooming China. Monitoring vast reserves of oil along with other minerals in that region and control over these resources is as strategic as global supplies increasingly become deficient. In particular, Afghanistan is the designed pipeline route to transport vast Caspian Sea oil reserves to the Western marketplace”.

Edward W. Said “in an article "Middle East Impasse" published in Dawn internet edition November 5, 2001, mentions that I know it is often argued that suicide bombings are either the result of frustration and desperation or that they emerge from the criminal pathology of unbalanced religious fanatics. But this is insufficient explanation”.

Michel Chossudovsky Revealed in his book "America's War on Terror" that al-Qaeda was the creation of the U.S Ministry of Defense and Washington deliberately patronaged Osama bin Laden and his network at the same time placing him on the most wanted list of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. During the Soviet-Afghan War, thousands of young Muslim zealots were recruited, organized and financed to protect Afghanistan from the clutches of the red menace and to tear down the Soviet Union on the battlefield of Afghanistan. CIA's Milton Beardman on one occasion declassified that if Osama bin Laden do not exist in real, it was essential to create him.

Soriano tries to investigate the relationship between media and terrorism with the statement of Marshall McLuhan who articulates that without communication terrorism would not exist. Although terrorism existed before the mass media, Soriano considered that it was always about to make a public subject and modern technologies have facilitated the dissemination of terrorist messages to the wider audience with a more concise message. It seems to be clear that there exists a mutually beneficial relationship between terrorists and the media today.

Aneel Salman 2006 describes that the September 11 attack on the Twin Towers of the World Trade Centre has opened a new horizon for research studies and added novel chapters in the history of modern civilizations. Unfortunately, terrorism and counter-terrorism have become big business today, in fact, a modified version of capitalism wants to unlock new frontiers of opportunities for corporatocracy and consumerism. The mighty west invades the lands of the poor, teardown the sovereignty and solidarity, breakdown the infrastructure, and boomed away the humane life and then corporate service providers seem to be devotedly engaged in rehabilitation and development activities under the flag of humanitarianism, and the target countries have no alternative other than accepting these fraudulent packages. It is an irony that destruction becomes the prerequisite for construction and development (Lippmann, 1922).

Bradley E. Wiggins, “Department of Communications Media Indiana University of Pennsylvania in his research ‘Framing the Truth U.S. media coverage during the War on Terrorism’ argues a War on Error discourse emerged as another symptom of the global terrorism meta-frame. Although the media have long engaged positive language when referencing U.S. personnel and concerns and negative language to describe a perceived enemy, the presence of 24-hour news channels holds this practice due to the economics of production and preserving substantive content”.

Chris Richard 2008 argues that “the game is all about empire. You have to start with an empire, develop it, fight against other empires and liberate other countries from their clutches and in the broad game you control over more oil, the more oil you have the more money you make and the more money you make, the more countries you can exploit and dominate”.

The Washington Post summed up Frey and Rohner's argument that "coverage caused more attacks and attacks caused more coverage, a mutually beneficial spiral of death has expanded because of the increased exposure of terrorism since September 11, 2001, and perhaps it can be said about the relationship in a simpler equation that more media coverage props up more terrorism”. 




Research Questions

The above study of the literature and basic consideration of the newspaper’s treatment led to the development of the following research questions.

The questions of interest to this study are:-

1. Whether and to what extent the terrorist acts are framed in the editorial contents of Dawn and The News?

2. What were the major themes used to frame terrorism/counter-terrorism by the leading English newspapers of Pakistan?

3. What was the treatment given to War against Terrorism in editorials of Dawn and The News?

The Rationale for Selecting Dawn and the News

Newspaper is one of the earliest forms of mass media to communicate human feelings and experiences. In Pakistan press is considered as the most credible responsible and popular member of the mass media. It has valuable status and special prestige in mass media society. It is also believed that print media is more credible than electronic media. Newspaper readership is much conscious about their related subject and considers them the free credible and responsible form of mass media. The freedom of the press stands that the press would have a liberated attitude toward the issues of national interest in the global community. 

After a long period of constitutionally controlled freedom the martial law regimes and the democratic struggle against gagging expression, the press in Pakistan has been able to win a considerable degree of freedom itself. So due to considerable credibility in comparison with the electronic media and the degree of freedom, diversity and responsibility, the researcher has selected the leading English newspapers (Dawn & The News) to study the War against Terrorism in 2011 at the national and international level. The reason behind the selection of these newspapers is that both the newspapers Dawn and The News are considered credible and responsible newspapers having prestige and popularity in their readership and have a credit of vast circulation inside and outside the country and leave a deep impact on the minds of the policymakers.

The logic behind the selection of these newspapers Dawn and The News is that these dailies are metropolitan newspapers having vast circulation and popularity among the readers. Both these newspapers are playing a significant role in covering national as well as international issues and are well known for their healthy criticism and journalistic responsibility. Both newspapers appeared regularly during the period under research review from January 1, 2011, to December 31, 2011.




Concept of Framing

American Political Scientist and media researcher Entman believes that framing in essence provides a way to analyze the power of a communicating text however in most work on framing the concept remains a lot open for interpretation and understanding for the researcher. He believes this is due to the fact that the basic terms of framing research, such as framing, a common frame and frame outside the academic world are almost the same (Bantimaroudis & Kampanellou 2007).

Entman explores the meaning of framing by stating that “it involves selection and salience. The frame is to select some aspects of a perceived reality and then make them more visible/salient in a communicating text in such a way as to promote the definition of a particular problem, causal interpretation, moral evaluation, and/or treatment recommendation”.

Entman (1993) states “four locations where we can find frames, the communicator, the text, the receiver, and the culture. Framing must be perceived as a process in which frame-building happens first, followed by frame-setting, and this process has its consequences as well (de Vreese, 2005). Frame-building takes place mainly in the interaction between journalists, elites and social movements, and the outcomes of the frame-building process are the frames manifest in the text. Frame-setting refers to the interaction between media frames and an individual's prior knowledge and predispositions”. (de Vreese, 2005, p. 52).

Iyengar (1991) defines “thematic and episodic frames. Thematic frames provide a deeper insight into the context, emphasize the general trends, and describe the key role in this process. Therefore they lead to attributing responsibility to society. Episodic frames focus on concrete events and situations and they lead to the assignment of responsibility to individuals”.

Vreese articulates "Frames are divided into two types i.e. issue-specific and generic. Issue-specific frames are pertinent only to specific topics or events while the generic ones are much more general. Generic frames transcend thematic limitations and can be identified in relation to different topics some even over time and in different cultural contexts. We distinguish five types of generic frames conflict, human interest, economic consequences, morality, and responsibility”. (Semetko &Valkenburg, 2000). 

According to the critical studies research the “U.S. media coverage of international news is largely based on foreign policy. Media, by and large, are supposed to be a co-worker of the government and a tool to endorse national standpoint in international relationships” (Lent, 1977; Merrill, 1995).

In the words of Ghanem and Takeshita “the concept of framing is central to the consideration of second-level agenda setting. In the context of agenda setting, framing is a process through which the media emphasize some aspects of reality and downplay other aspects. Framing can be accomplished through the consideration of particular subtopics through the size and placement of a news item, through the narrative form and tone of the presentation, and through particular details included in the media coverage”. 

Framing theory is a significant one in the sense that it assists researchers to understand how the world and incidents taking place in the world are portrayed, projected and framed in the media discourse. This theory has been widely used by the distinguished media scholars Gitlin, Mughees and Saleem accordingly and is becoming widely popular for the purpose of communication research studies. This theory is very helpful in investigating or exploring the relationship between media and other stakeholders.

In this study, the agenda-setting theory and concept of framing are used to explore the relationship of Pakistan's elite press with its foreign office about international affairs. Agenda setting theory is also very helpful to understand the framing modality used by the elite press of Pakistan during the Global War against Terrorism and to understand what extent and what kind of treatment is given by editorials of the English press of Pakistan while portraying the War against Terrorism (McCombs & Shaw 1972).

Results and Findings

The findings of this research comprise the quantitative and qualitative data. Quantitative findings show the comparative coverage of the editorials of Dawn and The News regarding the War on Terrorism from January 1, 2011, to December 31, 2011. On the other hand, the qualitative findings show the comparative direction of the editorials and the two newspapers during the same period. The following tables have been assembled to compare the editorial coverage/direction of both the newspapers Dawn and The News regarding War on Terrorism 2011.




 

 

Table 1

Comparison between "Dawn" and "The News" regarding their comparative direction for category A

Response	Newspaper	Mean	SD	SE	t-value	Prob.
Positive	Dawn	40.03	10.86	3.13	1.19 NS	0.245
	The News	35.55	7.15	2.06
Negative	Dawn	3.85	4.12	1.19	2.33*	0.030
	The News	0.88	1.60	0.46
Neutral	Dawn	1.06	1.58	0.46	-2.53*	0.019
	The News	3.77	3.36	0.97

NS = Non-significant (P>0.05); * = Significant (P<0.05) SD = Standard deviation SE = Standard error

 




Table 2 explains the comparative direction of the Editorials of Daily Dawn and The News about Terrorism and Counter-Terrorism (A) from January 1, 2011, to December 31, 2011. The table reflects that Dawn was 40.03% in favour, 3.85% against and remains 1.06% neutral towards Terrorism and Counter-Terrorism while The News was 35.55% in favour, 0.88% against and remains 3.77% neutral towards Terrorism and Counter-Terrorism. Both the respective newspapers remain more favourable towards Terrorism and Counter-Terrorism Rather than an unfavourable or neutral slant.




 

Table 2

Comparison between "Dawn" and "The News" regarding their comparative direction for B.

Response	Newspaper	Mean	SD	SE	t-value	Prob.
Positive	Dawn	6.22	3.54	1.02	-1.95 NS	0.064
	The News	10.60	6.93	2.00
Negative	Dawn	11.75	7.71	2.23	-0.02 NS	0.980
	The News	11.83	7.17	2.07
Neutral	Dawn	4.17	6.31	1.82	-0.12 NS	0.902
	The News	4.46	4.71	1.36

NS = Non-significant (P>0.05) SD = Standard deviation SE = Standard error

 




Table 2 illustrates the comparative direction of the Editorials of Daily Dawn and The News regarding Pak-US Relations and strategic partnership (B) from January 1, 2011 to December 31, 2011. The table reflects that Dawn was 6.22% in favour, 11.75% against and remains 4.17% neutral towards Pak-US Relations and strategic partnership while The News was 10.60%in favour, 11.83% against and remains 4.46% neutral towards Pak-US Relations and strategic partnership.




 

Table 3

Comparison between "Dawn" and "The News" regarding their comparative direction for C.

Response	Newspaper	Mean	SD	SE	t-value	Prob.
Positive	Dawn	0.38	1.31	0.38	0.09 NS	0.929
	The News	0.33	1.15	0.33
Negative	Dawn	2.77	5.91	1.71	-0.45 NS	0.656
	The News	4.17	8.91	2.57
Neutral	Dawn	0.00	0.00	0.00	-1.00 NS	0.328
	The News	0.30	1.03	0.30

NS = Non-significant (P>0.05) SD = Standard deviation SE = Standard error

 




Table 3 illustrates the comparative direction of the Editorials of The Dawn and The News regarding Raymond Allen Davis issue (C) from January 1, 2011, to December 31, 2011. The table reflects that The Dawn was 0.38% in favour, 2.77% against and remains 0% neutral towards Raymond Allen Davis issue while The News was 0.33%in favour, 4.17% against and remains 0.30% neutral towards Raymond Allen Davis issue. The News remains more unfavourable than The Dawn towards Raymond Allen Davis's issue during 2011.




 

Table 4

Comparison between "Dawn" and "The News" regarding their comparative direction for D.

Response	Newspaper	Mean	SD	SE	t-value	Prob.
Positive	Dawn	0.54	1.29	0.37	-0.65 NS	0.523
	The News	1.21	3.32	0.96
Negative	Dawn	2.54	6.00	1.73	1.46 NS	0.157
	The News	0.00	0.00	0.00
Neutral	Dawn	0.00	0.00	0.00	-1.00 NS	0.328
	The News	0.26	0.90	0.26

NS = Non-significant (P>0.05) SD = Standard deviation SE = Standard error

 




Table 4 illustrates the comparative direction of the Editorials of The Dawn and The News regarding Abbottabad Operation (D) from January 1, 2011, to December 31, 2011. The table reflects that The Dawn was 0.54% in favour, 2.54% against and remains 0% neutral towards Abbotabad Operation while The News was 1.21%in favour, 0.00% against and remains 0.26% neutral towards Abbotabad Operation.




 

Table 5

Comparison between "Dawn" and "The News" regarding their comparative direction for E.

Response	Newspaper	Mean	SD	SE	t-value	Prob.
Positive	Dawn	0.21	0.72	0.21	-0.18 NS	0.860
	The News	0.27	0.93	0.27
Negative	Dawn	3.73	3.87	1.12	-0.41 NS	0.685
	The News	4.58	6.02	1.74
Neutral	Dawn	0.88	1.63	0.47	1.86 NS	0.076
	The News	0.00	0.00	0.00

NS = Non-significant (P>0.05) SD = Standard deviation SE = Standard error

 




Table 5 illustrates the comparative direction of the Editorials of The Dawn and The News towards Drone attacks/ NATO Strikes (E) from January 1, 2011, to December 31, 2011. The table reflects that The Dawn was 0.21% in favour, 3.73% against and remains 0.88% neutral towards Drone attacks/ NATO Strikes while The News was 0.27%in favour, 4.58% against and remains 0% neutral towards Drone attacks/ NATO Strikes. The News remains more unfavourable than The Dawn towards Drone attacks/ NATO Strikes during 2011.




 

Table 6

Overall direction of the Editorials of Dawn and The News regarding the war on terrorism from January 1, 2011, to December 31, 2011.

Newspaper	1	2	3	No. of Editorials
Dawn	197 (56.28%)	102 (29.14%)	51 (14.57%	350
The News	208 (59.42%)	86 (24.57%)	58 (16.47%)	352
Total	405 (57.69%)	188 (26.78%)	109 (15.52%)	702

 




Table 6 illustrates the comparison of the whole direction of the Editorials of The Dawn and The News regarding the war on terrorism from January 1, 2011, to December 31, 2011. The table reflects that The Dawn was 56.28% in favour, 29.14% against and remains 14.57% neutral regarding the war on terrorism while The News was 59.42%in favour, 24.57% against and remains 16.47% neutral towards others category. The News remains more unfavourable than The Dawn towards others category during 2011.

Since 9/11 “the War on Terror is the significant and dominating frame that was used to impose war in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan and ultimately anywhere on this globe. It still remains a dominant foreign policy game which is still playing in U.S. military and security policies at home and abroad. The War on Terror frame not only shapes much of foreign and domestic policy but also defines the terms of debate hedging public and media discourse within its framework. War on Terror is being used as a master frame associated and interlinked with meta frames or subframes”.

§  Terror Frame and Fear Frame

§  Heroes Frame and Villain Frame

§  Absolute good Frame and Absolute Evil Frame

§  Friends Frame and Enemies Frame

Treatment of Editorials of Dawn

? The importance of  Pakistan's war against terrorism can be estimated in Dawn with the very first sunrise of January 1st 2011 when it published an editorial entitled Anti-terrorism courts. In this editorial, the writer was of the view that "terrorism today has become a severe danger for the peace of the globe but Pakistan still have not a strong mechanism to deal with terrorism acts. Pakistan needs a strong legal framework to deal with terrorism and terrorist activities (Meltzer, 2006). It is necessary that police and other administrative institutions should better train in criminal investigation and crime scene inspection and examinations. Pakistan is also lacking a strong witness protection programme which is also considered a barrier in the way of successful prosecution especially in terrorism cases. Without such a strong witness protection program witnesses can easily be threatened and ultimately the prosecution cases can easily be terrorized to silence".

? Dawn argues “in an editorial published on 6th of January with title ‘at war with ourselves' about the assassination of Salman Taseer' frame the incident as What really makes the societal war so alarming and provides the breeding ground for the extremists to plant their ideology. Mr Taseer`s killer may have been an `elite` policeman, but the educational system and cultural environment in which he grew up likely never equipped him with the tools to rationally reject the poison flowing in the society in which he lived and worked”. 

? As long as the state fights extremism apparently without all aspects of a strategy to combat extremism and to counter-extremism, more tragic deaths like this of Governor Taseer may be unavoidable. The shameful heroic reception showered to Taseer`s killer indicates how the task is complex and how the problem has become deep-rooted in our society. Truly we are at war with ourselves and at the moment it looks like the extremists are winning.

? Dawn articulates “in an editorial ‘Lahore shooting’ published on 29th January 2011 Thursday' shootout in Lahore is no drone attack that can be easily justified. Anti-American sentiments in the country are high. Without any cause, an American pumps bullets into a couple of young Pakistani boys and an alleged American consulate car crushes another to death”.

? Before this in December 2009 “four US citizens were detained in the city as they sought entry into the cantonment area. Reports at the time suggested the Americans had refused to be searched by the law enforcers. His origins and his circumstances are an ambiguity for the Pakistanis. That he was carrying sophisticated weapons apparently without legal authority, such matters raise suspicions”.

Treatment of Editorials of The News

The News, in an editorial, Drone Wars appeared on Monday 3rd of January 2011 editorialize the story around the analysis and figures of drone killings in Pakistan in the year 2010. These figures are retrieved from the South Asia Terrorism portal database and published in the Pakistanis elite newspapers. But nobody in this world nor any nation has taken into consideration the civilian killings nor any organization or agency challenge these killer drones. Historically “wars have winners and losers and the outcome of almost any war is clear for everyone to see. This may not be so in the context of the war now being fought in Pakistan and Afghanistan. There seems little doubt that the Americans and most of their partners in the coalition that is fighting the war have accepted that they are not going to win it in purely military terms. There will be no clear-cut defining victory but there may be significant future defeats – defeats which are as much a matter of perception as they are of battlefield statistics. The figures for fatal casualties which are the result of terrorist or extremist action in Pakistan this year, for instance, show a significant drop over 2009. There were 1,784 civilians killed this year as against 2,324 last; and there were 465 members of the military killed in 2010 as against 991 in 2009 – a drop of over 50 per cent. The terrorists saw their fatal casualty figures drop from 11,704 in 2009 to 7,324 in 2010”.

The News articulates its views on Sunday 9th January 2011 in the editorial Washington's Wisdom that every citizen in Pakistan who has even basic knowledge about international affairs recognized that rather than wisdom and humanity multidimensional strategic objectives are characteristic of United States foreign policy. When we try to explore the motives of US military interventions in Latin America Iraq Afghanistan and anywhere else we reached this shocking outcome that humanity is butchered in the name of peace (Berry, 1990). A great deal of suspicion arises from the perception that Pakistan's sovereignty has been repeatedly eroded by Washington and that key decisions which affect people in the country are made many thousands of miles away in the United States of America. There can be little doubt that fuel will have been poured on the flames by the comments of US ambassador Cameron Munter who on Friday went on record as saying that the US had a right to interfere in our affairs because it was our principal donor and it wanted to see its money well spent.

Conclusion

The researcher has endeavoured to present a clear and unbiased study to explore whether and to what extent news media covered, framed and communicate news stories during the War against Terrorism in the significant year of 2011. Pakistan attained the status of front line state in the Global War against Terrorism and its news media went hand in hand with the mainstream media to frame Global War against Terrorism. Pakistani news media drafted some thematic frames from the history of the Russo-Afghan war from a religious perspective. At the same time, mainstream media as well as Pakistani News Media ignored the economic objectives and corporate motives of The Bilderberg Group, the Trilateral Commission and The Council on Foreign Relations (CFR), the ruling groups of the United States and promotional arm of New World Order and corporate globalization. These frames can be classified as thematic and episodic according to their subject matter and intended interpretation to facilitate the explanation of the news stories and to generalize the master frame of Global Terrorism (Pan & Kosicki 1993).

As the researcher mentioned in the abstract of this study that the dusk of September Eleven a meeting of some selective members of the White House and Pentagon has been called and War on Terror has been launched officially by the United States and its allies all over the globe to combat terrorism in any region of the world and to eradicate the culture of extremism from all the human societies. After the terrorist attack of September Eleven, the War on Terror had emerged as a powerful organizing principle of foreign policy and international relations overarching the pre-existing principles of War against Weapons of Mass Destruction (WPMD), War against Drugs, War for Peace and Democracy and War against red menace (the former Soviet Union). 

The Pentagon quickly awarded a contract to The Rendon Group (a renowned public relations and strategic communication firm with offices in Washington, London and Islamabad) to counter the negative portrayal of US bombing in Afghanistan and abroad. For this purpose, the Rendon information warrior team trained in the Pentagon office of the strategic influence and then sent to Jakarta Indonesia, Islamabad Pakistan, Riyadh Saudi Arabia, Ankara Turkey and Tashkent Uzbekistan to deal with the biases of specific journalists for massive media mapping, news framing and for planting global terror frames along with other relevant thematic and episodic frames in the news items. The war against terrorism is actually the framing and fabrication of global terror threats to provide a justification for an un-ended War against Terrorism Globally and place it at the top of the list of foreign policy objectives and international relations of the nations.

In Pakistan, English newspapers play a vital role in the opinion formulation of the policymakers which determines the objective of foreign policy. Both the newspaper which are the focus of this study are considered the most popular, credible and responsible members of mass media. They enjoy special status and prestige in the public, especially among the ruling elites. People rely on the English press for an in-depth understanding of current issues and international scenarios with the help of editorials because editorial is the echo of a newspaper and the reflector of the policy of the newspaper. The Elite English press of Pakistan frames thematic and episodic frames in the context of the Master frame of Global Terror Threat toeing its foreign policy and strategic relation with the United States regarding front line state in the war against terrorism because after September 11 every nation reframed its international relations and the United States revisited its foreign policy objectives around the globe.

Undoubtedly, “September 11 was not only a tragic incident for the families and hometown of the victims but it was an attack on the sovereignty and solidarity of the United States of America. We are sorry for all of those that died on 9/11 and for all of those that died because of it. Because of those 19 sadistic hijackers America had declared war on two nations. At least 7, 23,206 people have been killed in Afghanistan and Iraq up till January 2009 and hundreds of thousands were victimized by the US conquest and by United States' need to feel safer and safest. Being a student of media and communication studies the researcher was forced to remain concentrated on the framing strategy to explore the terrorism & media relationship in the broader context of agenda-setting theory which was used during the Global War against Terrorism by the mainstream media but it may be the attention-grabbing area for the strategic communication researchers”.

But 9/11 is still a question mark “for investigation authorities to disclose the real bakers' sponsors and beneficiaries of this un-ended war. It is also a matter of significance for anthropologists to explore how the power players transfer the paradigms from one war to another like the war of drugs to the war for weapons of mass destruction and then to Global War against Terrorism. Cries of all the victims and tears of their families are still waiting for the kind considerations of historians, political and social scientists, and foreign policy and IR (International Relations) experts to study the lust of power players and to diagnose the mentality of both the terrorist and warmonger groups. The souls of all those that died on 9/11 and all of those that died because of it need the focus of the mainstream media and intellectuals to the crime and cause of their killing”.

Recommendations

In this research, the framing of the war on terrorism, by newspapers has been analyzed but there are still various dimensions and angles of this topic which can still be studied. Future research can be done on the following topics to have an insight and understanding of the war on terrorism.

First of all, research should be conducted on the different economic, social and political exploitations that led and forced some people to become violent, extremist and terrorist.

Media should play the role of watchdog regarding important issues rather than becoming a psycho weapon in the hands of have’s to control public opinion.

Survey research on what role the media can play in exaggerating and sensitising the events for media masters and different stakeholders. The media is not portraying the issues in an original manner. The researcher recommends some of the points:

? Media should play a positive role regarding important issues.

? Media should bring a true picture of conflict, events and issues in front of the public.

? The media should not be biased in showing anything.

? Media should not frame the issue in a way that reality becomes less.

? The media should watch our national interests in showing the issue.

? Media should not play a role in escalating the conflict.

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