Pakistan supports the promotion of human rights: Hina Rabbani Khar
Wednesday, October 31st, 2012 11:22:19 by Faisal Farooq
Despite many challenges on different fronts, Foreign Minister Hina Rabbani Khar has said that Pakistan strongly remains steadfast in its commitment to the promotion and protection of human rights.
In her opening statement at the 14th Session of the Universal Periodic Review (UPR) at the United Nations Human Rights Council in Geneva, the Foreign Minister said Pakistan’s resolve and commitment to combat terrorism remained unwavering.
She made efforts to gloss over bitter facts and painted an overly rosy picture of the country.
UPR is a state-driven process in which every UN member country gets a chance to make a presentation at the council about steps it had taken to address rights violations and fulfill its obligations.
Currently the second round of the review, which started in May this year, is under way. The UPR has been heralded as an unmatched international mechanism to monitor rights situation across the world.
Commenting on the drone campaign, the foreign minister termed the drone attacks as counter-productive, unlawful, against international law, and violation of sovereignty.
In her view, Pakistan has played a constructive role in building convergences between the West and Islamic world on the most contentious and challenging issues in the Human Rights Council.
Offering thanks to Chile, China and Congo, for facilitating Pakistan’s review, she Islamabad is a functional democracy with an elected and sovereign parliament, an independent judiciary, a free media and a vibrant and robust civil society.
Khar stated, “The reporting period (2008 to 2012) had been one of the most challenging in recent years for the country. Pakistan continued to face challenges on different fronts, ranging from security and terrorism to the economy, apart from natural calamities.”
She was of the opinion that they were still committed for the promotion of human rights despite many challenges on different fronts.
Explaining the situation, the minister said that the Parliament unanimously passed the 18th Amendment to the Constitution, addressing the many imbalances of power that had entered the legislative framework at the behest of military governments.
The key features of the 18th Amendment are its strengthening of human rights guaranteed under the Constitution.
The Right to Education (Article 25A), Right to Information (Article 19A) and Right to Fair Trial (Article 10A) are now recognized as fundamental rights, which cannot be suspended, she added.
Commenting on the issue of Malala Yousafzai, she they were simultaneously embracing the bright future that Malala represents for 180 million people of Pakistan, rejecting the dark vision of militants.
Tags: Chile, China, Congo, Foreign Minister Hina Rabbani Khar, Islamabad, Malala Yousafzai, Pakistan, UN, UNHRC, United Nations Human Rights Council Geneva, Universal Periodic Review, UPRShort URL: https://www.newspakistan.pk/?p=34516
Posted by Faisal Farooq
on Oct 31 2012. Filed under Latest News, National, Pakistan.
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Just go on talking about this and that so that you do not have time to address issues such as the Government sponsored persecution of the Ahmadiyya Muslim Jama’at and the mis-use of the blasphemy law.
Unfortunately Pakistanis still feel that the world is uninformed of the persecution of the minorities. They think they can continue killing the minority community at will, grab their properties, exhume their dead bodies from their graves, demolish their places of worship, drive them from their homes and take over their businesses with the help of the local, provincial and federal authorities and still tell the world that they are doing every thing too protect human rights. Yes, they will get a seat in the UN human Rights Organization, because their are plenty of countries to sell them their votes for unethical politicall gains. Little do these vote sellers know that they gains they expect would be transitory.