Shaheen Sehbai

Who is Shaheen Sehbai?

Shaheen Sehbai is a Pakistani-American journalist and the current Group Editor of daily English newspaper The News International. Shaheen Sehbai resigned from The News International in March 2002 after receiving a memorandum from his publisher admonishing him for publication of libellous matter, alienating advertisers, and being generally inaccessible to senior government officials as well his own staff among other complaints; Mr. Sehbai defended himself saying that he was being persecuted for failing to support the Musharraf government. In August 2002, the Committee to Protect Journalists sent a public letter to then-President Pervez Musharraf to draw his attention to alleged harassment of Shaheen Sehbai's family members living in Pakistan.

In July 2010, Shaheen Sehbai filed a defamation notice against Azeem Daultana, a member of the National Assembly of Pakistan, and two newspapers for publishing a column written by Azeem Daultana. The notice complains that Mr. Daultana's column alleges that Shaheen Sehbai has taken a "revenge mission" against the present President Asif Ali Zardari due to Shaheen Sehbai's being denied an Ambassadorship, a claim that was originally made in a column by Aftab Iqbal column published in the Urdu daily newspaper Nawa-i-Waqt on December 29, 2008.