The Council of Pakistan Newspaper Editors (CPNE) has worked since its foundation in 1957 as the combined body of newspaper editors in Pakistan to campaign for defence of press freedom and the right of access to information in the service of democratic practice and strengthening of democratic institutions in the country. However, one editor of the Business Recorder (newspaper) claimed the group was founded in 1958 by the merger of the Pakistan Newspapers Editors Conference and Newspapers Editors Council of Pakistan.