Washington, Sep 22 (IANS) The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Volker Turk, has accused Pakistani authorities of using “excessive lethal force and arbitrary detention” to suppress protests, while citing recent student demonstrations in India as an example of why dialogue with young leaders should take precedence over force, a report in American news website International Business Times (IBT) highlighted.
Addressing the 63rd session of the UN Human Rights Council earlier this month, Turk highlighted the contrasting responses to public protests in Pakistan and India, saying, “In Pakistan, the authorities have used excessive lethal force and arbitrary detention to quell protests," the IBT reported.
He immediately added: “The recent protests in India showed the best response is dialogue with youth leaders, not the excessive use of force,” the report stated.
The Council’s month-long session, which began on September 7 and runs through October 7, placed the remarks within a wider warning about the erosion of civic space. Although they did not amount to a standalone Council resolution, the stark contrast between the response to India and the criticism of Pakistan has added considerable political weight to the statement in South Asia, the report mentioned.
“That formulation is the source of the headline now travelling across social platforms. It is concise, and it is pointed. It does not name a particular Pakistani city, protest group or casualty figure. It does, however, sit on top of months of UN, Pakistani and international reporting on deadly unrest,” it noted.
According to the report, Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (PoK) has emerged as the most extensively documented flashpoint of the year.
Beginning in early June, the Joint Awami Action Committee (JAAC) spearheaded protests demanding action on electricity prices, governance and, above all, the issue of 12 reserved seats in the so-called legislative assembly. With negotiations failing, Pakistani authorities banned the JAAC under anti-terrorism laws, imposed communications restrictions and deployed huge police and paramilitary forces in the region.
On July 17, Turk’s office raised concerns over the situation ahead of the phased so-called legislative elections in PoK, calling for calm as reports emerged of hundreds of deaths since June, including mostly protesters and some security personnel.
The UN human rights office demanded "prompt, thorough and impartial investigations" into every death and warned that the criminalisation of a civil-society organisation and restrictions on gatherings threatened fundamental freedoms of expression, assembly and association, the International Business Times detailed.
Highlighting that the pattern is not confined to PoK, but has extended to several areas of Pakistan, the report said, “UN experts have separately criticised the use of force and anti-terror laws against Baloch protesters and human-rights defenders, including the life sentence imposed on Dr Mahrang Baloch. Arbitrary detention, internet blackouts and the listing of activists under restrictive schedules have been recurring features of the official response to dissent.”
“Turk's September sentence compresses that wider picture into a single charge: lethal force and arbitrary detention used to put protests down,” it added.
--IANS
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