LAHORE, March 29: The Human Rights Commission of Pakistan has observed that violation of rights sharply increased in 2007 in the country, and urged the new government to improve governance and prioritise its targets to grasp the nettle.

Releasing its annual report on the state of human rights in 2007 here at the Lahore Press Club, HRCP chairperson Asma Jahangir and director I.A. Rehman said the state of Pakistan was only half alive in 2007, naturally reducing its capacity to guarantee the people’s rights and proving to be one of the worst years in its history, if not the worst.

HRCP Secretary-General Syed Iqbal Haider, office-bearers from Sindh, Balochistan and the NWFP, and its members were present at the press conference. The commission is holding its Annual General Meeting on Sunday (today), besides organising a seminar on religious extremism.

Ms Jahangir said former SCBA president Munir A. Malik would be decorated with a medal for his major role in the lawyers’ struggle. She said the HRCP would also discuss the agenda announced by the new prime minister on Saturday.

She said there had been a sharp increase in all sorts of rights’ violations in the country last year. And the most import thing was that the past government considered itself unaccountable, feeling no need to conduct investigation into the carnage in Karachi. Even the crime scene was washed immediately after the assassination of former prime minister Benazir Bhutto, she said.

Giving details of the report, Mr I.A. Rehman said 55 of the 95 superior courts’ judges, including the chief justices of the Supreme Court and Sindh and Peshawar high courts, were removed on Nov 3 with an unprecedented use of emergency. The Supreme Court completed the hearing of a 2003 petition against the election of 68 legislators on certifications from religious seminaries, but the November events pre-empted a judgement, he said.

The court validated the proclamation of emergency and authorised Gen Musharraf to amend the Constitution. The new-look Supreme Court also dismissed legal challenges to Musharraf's eligibility as president.Former premier Nawaz Sharif and his family were stopped from returning to Pakistan and forcibly packed off to Saudi Arabia despite a Supreme Court verdict. A month later, he was allowed back in Pakistan at the Saudi king's initiative, recorded the report.

It further said the apex court found several top officials in the Islamabad administration guilty of gross incompetence and indulging in physical assault on the chief justice. Their jail terms were set aside after Nov 3.

Hearing in cases of disappearance led to a number of them being traced and some of them being released. A large number of lawyers hauled up during their nationwide agitation were charged under the Anti-Terrorism Act while some were charged with sedition. Many lawyers and judges were subjected to illegal restraints on them like house arrest.

A shooting-suicide bomb blast killed Ms Benazir Bhutto after a public gathering on Dec 27. Thirty other people were killed. Earlier on Oct 19, as many as 170 people were killed in twin suicide bombings targeting Ms Bhutto's convoy in Karachi, the HRCP director quoted the report.

At least 927 people were killed in 71 suicide blasts, which were more than those decimated in the war-torn Iraq. As many as 147 cases of torture and 65 of death in police custody were reported. Nearly 39 people were killed in 29 landmine explosions across Pakistan, he said.

He added that 234 people were killed in police encounters in Punjab alone. By July, families had paid ransom in 41 abduction cases in the Gujranwala police range. By September, there had been 55 abductions for ransom in Karachi.

President Musharraf rejected demands for an independent inquiry into the May 12 killings of around 40 people in Karachi for which a party supporting him was widely blamed. An armed standoff between seminary students and government troops in the heart of Islamabad left at least 100 people dead, the report read.

Special security measures and hordes of police guards for ministers and VVIPs were largely believed to be at the expense of the common man. In March, some 6,000 out of Karachi's total 29,000 policemen were guarding the city's elite. Despite elaborate security arrangements, the report said, Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz preferred to inaugurate development projects at his secretariat instead of the project sites.

JAILS, PRISONERS & DISAPPEARANCES: Prisons housed 95,016 detainees as against an authorised capacity of 40,825. Across Pakistan, 67 per cent of the prisoners were awaiting trial. As many as 134 convicts were executed and 309 awarded death sentence. There were over 7,000 prisoners on the death row.The number of missing persons in lists before the Supreme Court swelled to over 400 before the Nov 3 judicial purge abruptly ended hearings. Ninety-nine out of 198 missing persons on the HRCP’s list before the Supreme Court had been traced before Nov 3.

POLITICAL PARTICIPATION: Police routinely and systematically tear-gassed and beat up peaceful protestors apparently to suppress political opposition to the government. Eighty-eight of National Assembly’s 342 members resigned in protest against Musharraf’s re-election bid in uniform. As many as 107 members did not say a single word on the floor of the assembly during the 4th parliamentary year.

The National Assembly passed 51 bills in five years compared to 134 ordinances promulgated by the president. The assembly completing its full five-year term was seen as self-serving exercise by Musharraf to get re-elected. It twice elected in its one term a serving military general as president, according to the report.

Draft voters’ lists in June 2007 contained only 52.1 million voters instead of the projected 82 million. The ratio of religious minorities and women among omitted voters was very high and the final list in October swelled to 80.4 million.

FREEDOM OF MOVEMENT: Political leaders, judges, activists and many others were subjected to curbs on their movement throughout the year, and more intensely after the declaration of emergency. Section 144 was widely used by the government as the legal cover for such restriction.

The deposed chief justice and his family were under house arrest for the most of the year even though the government did not officially announce or admit it. Names appeared on and were taken off the exit control list (ECL) without any reason given and cases were constantly challenged by many on the list which contained hundred of names.

FREEDOM OF THOUGHT, CONSCIENCE & RELIGION: Sectarian violence claimed 580 lives and wounded another 1,120. The militants entrenched themselves in parts of the NWFP and the tribal areas, taking over several towns and implementing their version of Shariah. They also targeted girls’ schools and CD shops and threatened religious minorities to convert to Islam or leave the area, the HRCP noted with regret.

The Shia community remained the main target of sectarian attacks. Five Ahmedis were murdered while 36 faced prosecution in faith-related cases. Places of worship and graveyards remained a target of the land-grabbing mafia.

FREEDOM OF EXPRESSION: Unprecedented curbs were placed on electronic and print media following the government’s attack on the judiciary and imposition of emergency. At least seven journalists were killed and 73 injured, mostly by police. Security forces arrested 250 reporters for covering anti-government protests or for demonstrating against restrictions on the media.

Pakistan's standing in terms of Press freedom over the last 50 years plummeted to 152 in rankings maintained by an international media watchdog. Another US-based media supervisory organisation included Pakistan among the 10 worst countries for the press freedom.

FREEDOM OF ASSEMBLY: Political and religious gatherings, rallies and demonstrations were usually banned across the country under the excuse that these increased security risks. However, the law-enforcement agencies failed to apply this rule to government-favoured party and groups’ rallies. Women protesters were beaten up and manhandled by men assigned law-enforcement duties on many occasions.

FREEDOM OF ASSOCIATION: All those who were associated with protesting bodies were brutalised by the law-enforcement agencies throughout the year. The government acknowledged the arrests of over 5,000 in November alone.

Students in many educational institutions were warned of expulsion if they showed interests in any protest. Various NGOs working for women’s rights, awareness and family planning were forced to shut down or relocate from the Northern Areas after bomb blasts from militants.

The government tried to tighten its hold around NGOs by formulating a Code of Conduct, but faced extreme criticism for its closed and faulty modus operandi.

ABUSE AGAINST WOMEN: The number of violations against women remained high and there were countless reports of brutal attacks on them. The HRCP recorded 1,202 killings of which honour-killing crimes were 636. There were 755 cases of sexual harassment in which 377 victims, including 166 minors, were raped, and 354 (including 92 minors) were gang-raped. There were 736 kidnappings, 143 attacks by burning and many other abuses against women.

The assassination of Punjab Minister Zile Huma and PPP chairperson Benazir Bhutto marked 2007 as a deadly year for women politicians. Female students and teachers received numerous threats to their lives and were told to observe purdah (veil). The ensuing bomb scares and blasts at girls’ educational institutions badly affected the attendance and enrolment.

CHILDREN: Around 2,038 juvenile prisoners were awaiting trial all over the country because of the non-implementation of a law made in 2000 for their protection. Children, especially minor girls, continued to be the victims of widespread sexual and physical abuse. At least 258 cases of rape and gang-rape and 138 deaths by killing were reported.

Child labour and trafficking remained rampant in 2007. Children in the earthquake and refugee camps were vulnerable to harsh weather conditions, disease, contaminated water and lack of extensive medical attention, the report said.

LABOUR: Unemployment and financial restraints forced people to take desperate measures. There were 330 suicides and 189 attempted suicides due to these reasons. The number of bonded labourers swelled to 17 million. Labour laws were largely ignored and working conditions and salaries were in gross violation of basic worker rights.

EDUCATION: Education became a commodity which only the moneyed people could afford, forcing the poor to send their children to substandard government schools, emerged as another deplorable issue.

HEALTH: The situation on the health front also remained worst. As many as six cases of polio were reported despite the fact the disease had been ‘eradicated’ in the country. Despite the law to prevent organ transplant, the incidence of renal transplant remained high.

Replying to questions, Ms Jahangir said the abolition of the statutory bail system was a major cause for the overcrowding of Pakistani jails. She said the human rights issues were a challenge for the new government which could not resolve these immediately, but must make a positive start in this direction.