Human Rights Commission South Asia

CONTACT US     RESOURCES & LINKS       ABOUT US        HUMAN RIGHTS  REPORTS        CONTRIBUTE

PAKISTAN

TIME TO TAKE HUMAN RIGHTS SERIOUSLY

A culture of violence prevails in Pakistan. Elected governments have failed to repair the damage caused by long periods of martial law during which civil and political rights were suspended political institutions destroyed and the Constitution distroted. Torture, including rape, is widespread in Pakistan. Police often intimidate and humiliate people in custody, beat, kick and use eletric shocks on detainees, hang them upside down and deprive them of food and sleep. Many people die as a result of torture every year. Yet virtually no police have been brought to justice for torturing or killing detainees.

The police do not just show utter contempt for the human rights of detainees, but also for the leagal process. The often choose to shoot criminal suspects or so-called ` terrorists` dead rather than arrest them. Scores of people are extrajudicially executed in Pakistan every year. The official story is always that police fired in self defence even when their victims have been seen to be arrested disarmed and hand-cuffed.

TORTURE AND ILL-TREATMENT OF POLITICAL

PRISONERS

Political prisoners held in unacknowledged detention as well as some other political prisoners, have been denied regular access to family and lawyers and to adequate medical care. The Pakistan-based Lawyers Committee for Human Rights and Legal Aid stressed in its report on political detention in 2004 that a large number of detainees are held in solitary confinement in so-called "bund ward" (closed) cells" from which they are released only for one hour in the morining and in the evening. For instance Amir Khan from (Mohajir Qaumi Movement) is known to have been kept in solitary confinement since his arrest in October 2003. Political prisoners are also reported to be kept in handcuffs and shackles, including bar fetters Lawyers representing political prisoners report that their clients are frequently brought to court hearings in chains and leg irons. Political prisoners held in police custody are frequently subjected to torture and other forms of cruel inhuman or degrading treatment. The purpose of torture appears to be the extraction of confessions, although in some cases torture has been used to obtian information of the political activities of opposition parties. High- ranking party members seen to be less at risk of being ill-treatred, possibly because of the degree of publicity wihich would surrond any allegation that they had been tortured. Yet even an MPA like Younus Khan was reportly subjected to ill-treatment such as being chained by the wrists to the window bars of his cell for several hours.

TORTURE AND ILL-TEATMENT

Human Rights Commission South Asia is concerned about the widespread use of torture and other forms of ill-treatment including rape, reportedly used by police and paramilitary presonnel to extract confessions, to exert pressure on detainees to make them implicate other political opponents in crimes and to intimidate them. Methods of torture have included suspending prisoners from their wrists or ankles, beating prisoners, threatening to harm the relatives of prisoners, depriving prioners of sleep and food, and rape of women detainees or relatives of political prisoners. Human Rights Commission South Asia is concerned that the widespread practice of holding detainees in incommunicado and unacknowledged detention creates an environment in which torture and ill-treatment are more likely to occur as law enforcment personel are able to act with impunity. Investigations into reported cases of torture in Pakistan are at most perfunctory and have not to Human Rights Commission Sout Asia knowledge led to any convictions of the persons responsible for ordering or using tourture.

The prohibition against torture is one of the most fundamental norms in international law. The Univeral Declaration of Human Rights clearly states in Article 5. "No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment "Pakistan is not a signatory to the UN Convention against Torture and Cruel . Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment which makes it binding (in Atrticle 2(1) upon its signatories to "take effective legislative, administrative judical or other measures to prevent acts of torture in any terriory under its jurisdiction." Human Rights Commission South Asia once again urge the Government to ratify or accede to this fundamental Convention Ratification of this instrument will not in itself end torture in Pakistan but it will provide to basic framework within which the Government can work towards the eradication of torture.

Torture is prohibited in a limited sense by Artical 14(2) of the Constitution of Pakistan which says "No person shall be subjected to tourture for the purpose of extracting evidence." Until very recently torture has not been defined as an offence under the Pakistan Penal Code. However under the Qisas and Diyat Ordinance which was first promulgated in September 1990 and has been repromulgated several times since, a form of torture does appear as a separate, punishable offence Uner the Ordinance, the causing of hurt by any person to extort "any confession or any information which may lead to the detection of any offence or misconduct...`` is defined as a separate crime. The crime is subject to the kind of punishment provided for the form of hurt caused including qisas or equal punishemtn for the hurt caused, together with imprisonment. In its memorandum to the Government of Pakistan in May 2000. Human Rights Commission South Asia had recommended that torture be introduced in criminal law as a specific criminal offence and that a wider definition be introduced in the constitutional prohibition of torture in keeping with the definition contrained in Article 1 of the UN Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment. While welcoming the inclusion of a form of torture as a criminal offence under the Qisas and Diyat Ordinance. Human Rights Commission South Asia remains opposed to the provision for it to be punsihed in a manner in itself considered cruel, inhuman or degrading by international human rights standards. In july 2001 Human Rights Commission South Asia raised its concern baout recent reports of torture and deaths in police custody with the Government of Pakistan but has to date not received any reply.

Human Rihgts Commission South Asia once again calls on the Government of Pakistan to ensure that police officer be clearly instructed that torture, including rape, is an offence, that all instances of torture be investigated by an independent and impartial body, that the results of such an investgation be publised promptly and that the alleged prepetrators be brought to justice. Human Rights Commission South Asia also recommends that incommunicado detention, during which most instances of torture are reported to have taken place, be strictly limited, that prompt and regular access of the prisoner to legal counsel, medical care and family be ensured that the authorities entrusted with detention and interrogation be separated and that clear guidelines governing interrogation and the prohibition of torture be issued to all police peronnel.

Human Rights Commission South Asia also once again urges the Government of Pakistan that all cases of deaths in custody alleged to result from torture be thoroughly, promptly and impartially investigated. As outlined in Principle 9 of the UN Principles on the Effecive Prevention and Investigation of Extra-legal, Arbitrary and Summary Execution, adopted by the UN Economic and Social Council in 1989 and endorsed by the UN General Assembly on 15 December 1989 in resolution 44/162 "There shall be thorough, prompt and impartial investigation of all suspected cases of extra-legal, arbitrary and summary executions...Governments shall maintain investigative offices and procedures to undertake such inquiries. The purpose of the investigation shall be to determine the cause manner and time of death, the person responsible and any pattern or practice which may have brouht about the death. It shall include an adequate autopsy, analysis of all physical and documentary evidence and statement of witnesses". The results of such inquiry should promptly be made public and the alleged perpetrators be brought to justice.

EXTRA-JUDICIAL EXECUTIONS

Possible extra-judical executions, some of which may have taken place in the context of so-called encounter killings, are of particular concern to Human Rights Commission South Asia Extra-judical executions by security personnel are strictly prohibited by Article 9 of the Constitution of Pakistan which states: "No person shall be deprived of life or liberty save in accordance with law." Extra-judicial executions violate the Universal Declaration of Human Rights which unequivocally states in Article 3: "Everyone has the right to life, liberty and security of person." Similarly the ICCPR lays down in Article 6(1): "Every human being has the inherent right to life. This shall be protected by law. No one shall be arbitrarily deprived of his life." The Principles on the Effective Prevention and Investigation of Extra-legal. Arbitrary and Summary Executions in Principle 1 lays down: "Governments shall prohibit by law all extra-judicial, arbitrary and summary executions and shall ensure that any such executions are recognized as offence under their criminal laws, and are punishable by appropriate penalities which take into account the seriousness of such offences. Exceptional circumstances including a state of war, internal political instablity or any other public emergency may not be invoked as a justification of such executions. Such executions shall not be carried out under any circumstances..."

Human Rights Commission South Asia urgently calls on the Government of Pakistan to implement the preventive measures recommended by the Principles for the Effective Prevention and Investgation of Extra-legal, Argitrary and Summary Executions. It futher calls upon the Government promptly to initiate a full independent and impartial inquiry into such killings to establish the circumstances in which they occurred and whether any of them were the result of unlawful and unnecessary use of lethal force by the security forces. The terms of reference and findings of such an enquiry should be made public at the eraliest opportunity and any members of the security forces alleged to be responsible for the killing should be brought to justice.

Human Rights Commission South Asia futher calls on the Government to ensure that all law enforcement personnel are clearly instructed that in accordance with international standards contained in the Code of Conduct of Law Enforcement Officials, adopted by the UN General Assembly on 17 December 1979 and the Basic Principles on the Use of Force and Firearms by Law Enforcement Officials, adopted by the Eighth UN Congress on the Prevention of Crime and the Treatment of Offenders in September 1990, lethal force may not be used except in genuine life-threatening circumstances and only as a last resort.

Finally, Human Rights Commission South Asia recommends that the Government of Pakistan seriously consider the accession to or ratification of the International Covenant on Civil and Policical Rights and the Convention against Torture and other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment.