HRCP laments govt’s apathy to human rights
* Commission’s Director IA Rehman says government lies about rights situation
* AHRC report sites continued rights abuse
LAHORE: Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP) Director, IA Rehman, said that let alone the citizens, the country’s government too is unaware about the human rights laws. Pakistan has signed a number of human rights laws in the United Nations (UN) conventions but due to the government’s negligence, these laws have not been implemented.
Rehman said this while addressing the final session of a three-day human rights folk school session at the National Council of Churches on Sunday. The theme of the workshop was “Effective Documentation for Lobbying”. The event was organised by the Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC).
He said that in the years 2003 and 2006, Pakistan had committed to the human rights, civil rights and child rights conventions, however, the situation of human rights’ violation is worsening day by day.
“Promises and lies concerning violence of human rights are at their peak at the government level,” Rehman said, adding that therefore each individual of the country should himself be aware of these laws and legislations in order to struggle for his rights.
A senior AHRC official, Baseer Naweed, said that the commission has expressed deep concerns over the state of human rights in Pakistan in its annual report for 2010. He said the report observed that the condition of human rights in Pakistan in 2010 remained grave. The AHRC had encountered cases and situations which indicated continued systematic abuse of human rights as well as areas critically affected by conflict and the absence of the rule of law, he added.
AHRC Programme Officer, Moon Jeong, said that the AHRC had also been organising meetings where activists, who had been working closely with the victims of human right violations, from all across the country gather and discuss about their struggles and the actual problems they face in the field.
Jeong said that the meetings are quite informal where people who have problems in this regard gather for discussion and try finding solutions for their problems.
At the end, certificates were distributed among all the participants of the workshop. Participants from all across country including Lahore, Karachi, Sargodha, Mianwali, Okara, Faisalabad and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, attended the workshop.
Source: Daily Times
Date:3/28/2011
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