At UN, Pakistan calls for countering disinformation, fake news campaigns threatening world stability

UNITED NATIONS, Oct 20 (APP): Pakistan has warned that a wave of online disinformation and fake news represents an “emerging and unconventional” threat to a stable world order and called for “urgently” addressing the phenomenon.
“The issue of disinformation, hate speech and fake news needs to be analyzed, debated and addressed from the perspective of security, development and human rights, with a view to promote workable solutions”, Ambassador Usman Iqbal Jadoon, deputy permanent representative of Pakistan to the UN, told the UN General ASsembly’s Fourth Committee, which deals with special political and decolonization matters.
In this regard, he said the revelation of a vast clandestine network waging an information war against Pakistan for more than 20 years was an example of “bad” state actors.
“They are continuing in their campaigns, targeted at Pakistan, the people of occupied Jammu and Kashmir, Muslims, Christians, Sikhs and ‘lower’ caste Hindus,” Ambassador Jadoon added.
Disinformation campaigns, he said, were accompanied by “no information” strategies to suppress the freedom of expression when some states choose to impose information blackout, institute digital surveillance and target journalists and others who dare to report the truth.
The vast and viral disinformation about the ongoing Middle East crisis underlines the need for fact-checking and promoting information integrity, the Pakistani envoy said.
Given the potential to inflict harm, he underscored the need to accelerate the formulation and adoption of a Code of Conduct to ensure information integrity in digital spaces that have been turbo-charged by artificial intelligence.
“The rapid rate at which hate speech, Islamophobia, racial profiling and discrimination are being spread, in traditional media and particularly in the digital space, poses an unprecedented pervasive threat to social order, stability and the rule of law,” Jadoon said.
At the outset of his remarks, the Pakistani envoy expressed gratitude to the international community for standing by Pakistan during climate-change-induced floods there, and said that such disasters demonstrate the need for timely and accurate information.
In conclusion, he said, “Pakistan will continue to play its active and constructive role, including as the current chair of the Committee on Information, to promote effective outcomes of these challenges.”