Pakistan got 116th position in world press freedom index

Pakistan ranks at 116th place out of 140 countries in the freedom of press rankings, as per the World Economic Forum.

Democracies are dependent on freedom of speech, media, press to thrive. And Pakistan score is not that high on press freedom.

The top 10 countries in terms of press freedom in the world are Norway, Finland, Sweden, Netherlands, Denmark, Switzerland, New Zealand, Jamaica, Belgium, and Costa Rice.

It is interesting to note that countries like China, Vietnam, Saudi Arabia, and Iran are all listed at the bottom of the table.

The World Economic Forum Index evaluates the performance of countries and regions with regard to media freedom.

Responses are taken by different experts using a questionnaire to rank countries on the basis of the degree of freedom. Along with this quantitative analysis is done to measure abuses and acts of violence against journalists during the period evaluated.

The criteria used to evaluate media freedom includes pluralism, media independence, media environment and self-censorship, legislative framework, transparency, and infrastructure quality.

Here is list of first 20 country in list issued by World Press Freedom Index 2019

The scores have been taken from the world press freedom index and interestingly china, Vietnam, Saudi Arabia and Iran are all listed the bottom of the table.