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International charity
Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) is taking legal action against the producers of
a new Bollywood film, saying its misrepresentation of the medical group could
put its aid workers deployed in conflict zones at risk. Action-thriller
"Phantom" was released on Friday and features British-Indian actress
Katrina Kaif as an MSF aid worker who helps a disgraced Indian soldier, played
by actor Saif Ali Khan, to assassinate Pakistani militants accused of being
behind the 2008 Mumbai bombings.
In
promotional interviews for the Hindi film this week, Kaif was quoted as saying,
"NGO workers have ties with local fanatical groups" in war-torn
regions, without mentioning that many aid groups maintain strict neutrality in
order to do their work safely.
In
the film's trailer, her character is seen firing a pistol and rifle in two
different scenes.
MSF
said it had not been consulted over the content of the film and was not
associated with it in any way. The humanitarian agency had "a strict no
guns policy" in all its clinics and did not employ armed guards, it added.
Thomson
Reuters Foundation report continues:
"None
of our staff would ever carry a gun. Any portrayal that suggests otherwise is
dangerous, misleading and wrong," MSF said in a statement late on
Thursday.
"We
have contacted the film's production team and are taking legal action in order
to correct this dangerous misrepresentation of our organization and its
work."
The
film's director Kabir Khan and producers Sajid Nadiadwala and Siddharth Roy
Kapur could not immediately be reached for comment.
"Phantom"
was banned by a Pakistani court last week in response to a petition filed by
Hafiz Saeed, the man India accuses of masterminding the killing of 166 people
over three days in November 2008.
Saeed,
the founder of Lashkar-e-Taiba which the United Nations has listed as a
terrorist organization, said the film whose main villain is a man called
"Hariz Saeed" maligns Pakistan and vilifies him.
MSF
- which has thousands of health workers such as doctors, nurses, surgeons,
anaesthetists and psychiatrists in more than 70 countries - said it was
essential that the group was not misrepresented given the dangerous nature of
their work.
"The
only way we can safely work in places such as Syria, Afghanistan and Yemen,
where there is active fighting, is by explaining to every group on the ground
that we are independent, neutral and impartial and interested only in providing
medical care to people who need it," MSF said.
"Any portrayal that
suggests MSF does anything other than provide medical care could endanger our
patients, staff, our ability to work in places where people might not otherwise
have access to healthcare and undermine our reputation."
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