Geneva: UN Human Rights Committee to review Pakistan’s human rights records amid ‘rampant rights abuses’

Pakistan’s second review under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), to which the country is a state party, is scheduled for this week on 17 and 18 October at the UN Human Rights Committee in Geneva. “Pakistan’s review comes at a crucial time for the country, as human rights violations and abuses remain rampant,” said Babu Ram Pant, Amnesty International’s Deputy Regional Director for South Asia. “Two blasphemy-related extrajudicial executions by the police, crackdown on protests, enactment of the restrictive Peaceful Assembly and Public Order Act 2024, arbitrary detention and mass arrests of opposition workers and leaders, ban on the Pashtun Tahaffuz Movement, and harassment of human rights defenders like Mahrang Baloch – have all been reported in the duration of past month alone. “The review presents an opportunity for the Pakistani government to take stock of the state of human rights in the country and implement concrete measures to address the human rights concerns raised during the review.”