On the International Human Rights Day CLAAS condemns the abuse of the Blasphemy Laws in Pakistan and calls for change
On the commemoration of International Human Rights day Nasir Saeed, CLAAS UK Coordinator, expressed his concern about the violation of the human rights of religious minorities in Pakistan.
Furthermore, Saeed urged the Government of Pakistan to make serious efforts to improve the situation. The religious minorities in Pakistan, he said, are often targets of persecution and little is being done to protect them.
The worst violation of human rights in Pakistan stems from the abuse of the Blasphemy law. In 2008 the number of cases of individuals from minority groups, especially Christians, falsely accused of blasphemy increased.
During the these last six months that least six blasphemy cases were registered against Christians. These cases include Dr. Robin Sardar for not allowing Mohammad Rafique to open a shoe stall in front of his surgery, Reverend Frank John for using a loud speaker at a religious gathering, Danish Masih for refusing to convert to Islam and Imran Masih and his wife for allegedly tearing an Islamic book.
Nargis Bibi’s life turned upside down when an angry mob attacked the clinic and accused her of blasphemy while a 27 year old, Jagdesh Kumar was murdered by his factory co-workers.
The Blasphemy law ignites religious extremism, feeds intolerance and is open to abuse. The very existence of this law encourages hostility against the religious minorities, especially Christians. Many Christians in Pakistan today feel insecure and anxious in their own towns, villages and homes living in fear of being falsely accused of crimes they did not commit by Muslims who might have scores to settle with them.
The Blasphemy law provokes hatred and hostility towards religious minorities, particularly against Christians, who are blamed by fanatic Muslims as connected to Christians in the West and therefore responsible for the wars and suffering in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere.
The use of this law promotes religious intolerance. Often when one Christian is accused of blaspheming his or her family, friends and even the whole Christian neighbourhood, is attacked. In the recent years, several churches and homes have been attacked and set to fire, even whole villages have been targeted by mobs of angry Muslims.
I urge the present Government of Pakistan, who view themselves as liberal, moderate and enlightened, said Saeed, to bring changes to this infamous law to stop further devastation to the religious minorities in Pakistan.
CLAAS condemns violence against women and young girls from minority groups in Pakistan
On the 25th of November 2008, the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women, CLAAS spoke to various national UK press representatives about the violence endured by women in Pakistan. It also challenged the Pakistani government to take immediate action for protecting the rights of young girls and women, especially from minority groups.
The said truth - said Mr Saeed, is that violence against women continues to be a fact of life in Pakistan. During the last nine months 2039 women and young girls have suffered unjustly.
Data published in a recent report about violence and abuse of women in Pakistan shows that out of the 2039 cases mentioned above 107 women were killed by relatives, 95 were murdered by their brothers, fathers or husbands in so called honour killings. Another 78 women committed suicides, while 359 women were subjected to domestic violence.
Furthermore, 317 women were abducted and 264 were raped. Tragically,
48 women became victims of acid attacks and 53 were set on fire after being sprinkled with kerosene oil or petrol.
Commenting on this report Mr Saeed said: Unfortunately, we believe that the number of abused women is much higher than the 2039 figure mainly because many cases of violence against women are often unreported and the victims of abuse struggle in silence.
One of the common targets of abuse and violence, continued Mr Saeed, are Christian women. One of the reasons for this is that poor Christian women working as domestic servants or, in factories and fields are thought of as
inferior human beings. Therefore, they are an easy target for sexual predators or, for fundamentalists who kidnap these women, rape them and then marry them off to Muslim men forcefully converting them to Islam.
During these last two decades CLAAS has defended the rights of hundreds of abused Christian women and girls and fought to bring their abusers to justice. But, this is not an easy task especially when local police authorities keep turning a blind eye and courts are biased or forced to protect the perpetrators simply because they are men and Muslims. This attitude of the police and courts encourages criminals who use Islam as a façade to legitimize acts of violence to continue terrorizing vulnerable and Christian women and young girls.
However, despite of the depressing statistics Mr Saeed is optimistic about the future of women in Pakistan especially at this time when new legislation on sexual harassment ‘Protection for Women from Harassment Act’ is about to be approved by the Parliament of Pakistan in December 2008.
Once approved the new bill will hopefully help to protect the rights of all Pakistani women and ensure that women from religious minority groups are treated fairly.
However, concluded Mr Saeed, if the Pakistani government truly cares for the welfare of religious minority women then they should think seriously about brining in new legislation to stop forced conversions to Islam.
Raising public awareness about forced conversions, the damage they cause to women and families and lobbying the Pakistani government on behalf of Christian women and girls who have suffered from these conversions will be one of the priorities of CLAAS’ work in the coming year.
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For more information and case studies of CLAAS work please contact Nasir Saeed on: 0208 8679 180