A Pakistani journalist charged with spreading disinformation online was granted bail on Friday after he was seized from his home following a social media post sharing an investigation into a military general.

The country has been ruled by the military for several decades of its 77-year history and criticism of the security establishment has long been seen as a red line.

Muhammad Waheed Murad, a multimedia journalist for Saudi-owned Urdu News, was “abducted” in the early hours of Wednesday, when more than a dozen people stormed his home without a warrant, according to his family and lawyer.

Murad appeared in court a few hours later, charged with committing “cyber terrorism” and spreading “false and fake information”.

But he was granted bail on Friday, met by colleagues who congratulated him, according to an AFP journalist.

Murad’s lawyer criticised his detention as the latest assault on press freedom in the South Asian nation.

“The recent enforced disappearance and subsequent registration of a fake FIR (charge sheet) against journalist Muhammad Waheed Murad is part of Pakistan’s continuing clampdown on dissent,” Imaan Mazari told AFP.

“Journalism is not a crime (…) we demand an end to the censorship in Pakistan and to the repression and attacks on journalists,” she added.

Among the accusations against Murad is sharing an investigation into a military general on Facebook and suggesting the military is losing control in a mineral-rich southwestern province bordering Afghanistan and Iran.

Murad is the second reporter in recent days to come up against Pakistan’s strengthened laws targeting online content.

His arrest follows the detention last week of Farhan Mallick, founder of Pakistani internet media channel Raftar, who is facing charges of “anti-state posts and fake news”.

He was denied bail on Friday.

The arrest came in the same week that two brothers of exiled journalist Ahmad Noorani were “kidnapped” from their home after he wrote about the growing influence of the powerful military chief’s family, according to press group Reporters Without Borders.

The Islamabad Inspector General of Police (IGP) on Thursday said efforts to find and recover them would last two weeks.

Pakistan is ranked 152 out of 180 countries in Reporters Without Borders’ press freedom index.

The criminalisation of online disinformation has spread fear in Pakistan, with journalists among those worried about the potentially wide reach of the law.