Coverage of Taliban conflict in the Pak–Afghan press: A comparative analysis

This study offers a quantitative analysis of the coverage of Taliban conflict in the four leading newspapers of Pakistan and Afghanistan through the perspective of war and peace journalism—developed by Johan Galtung and adopted by many scholars. Consistent with the existing literature, the researcher found that both the English and vernacular press in the two countries predominantly reported the Taliban conflict through war journalism framing. The local press was equally escalatory while reporting on the conflict. The press in the two countries showed remarkable differences in the war journalism framing but applied similar thematic strategies of peace journalism. The study advocates an academic juncture between political communication and peace journalism scholarship to identify the issues that influence media content during conflict times for better understanding of the potential role of media in peace and conflict resolution