Last week, the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP) organized a day-long national consultation in Islamabad on torture of suspects in the custody of law enforcement agencies and the impunity of the crime. The consultation included legislators, human rights defenders, law enforcement agencies and civil society members who produced some worthwhile recommendations for the government to heed.
The conference noted that both state and society are responsible for torture. While state agencies employ torture for extracting confessions and other reasons, the society is complicit for not raising strong voices against it. Torture is inherent in a legal system that retributory instead of reformatory in nature. Calls for public hangings of criminals are a reflection of the attitude towards crime and punishment.
We also live in a state of denial. Look up the official reports submitted to the UN’s human rights bodies periodically. If these reports are to be believed, there is simply no torture in any police lock up or other detention centre in the country. Religion and the Constitution both prohibit torture and degrading a person, and there is no torture anywhere in the country, our official reports seem to claim.
However, at the last meeting of UN Committee Against Torture sometime back, the shadow report of the independent National Commission on Human Rights (NCHR) of Pakistan, permitted by law to submit its reports, belied unrealistic official claims. Then headed by Justice Chowhan, the NCHR report virtually rebutted all claims made in the official report.
As a result, the NCHR was disbanded at the first available opportunity. No new appointments were made when the term of its chairman and members expired in May last. When the posts were advertised - and the former chairman also was a candidate - the selection process was abruptly suspended. The posts were re-advertised but not before arbitrarily imposing an age limit, not provided for in the original law, so that the former chairman was effectively debarred.
The national consultation recommended enactment of anti-torture legislation. Pakistan signed the Convention Against Torture (CAT) in 2008 and ratified it two years later, in 2010. Ratification of CAT has made it obligatory to make domestic legislation. However, there is no legislation despite unanimous adoption of a private member bill by the Senate in March 2015, also endorsed by the Ministry of Human Rights.
The bill passed by the Senate was sent to the National Assembly which referred it to the relevant committee but could not be passed within the stipulated 90-day period. It was then referred to the joint sitting of the Parliament in January 2017. Nearly three years have passed but it has not been taken up in a joint session of the Parliament.
The present government had promised to immediately bring in anti-torture legislation. However, every time the matter is raised in the human rights committees of Parliament, the standard response of the government is that the draft bill has been finalized and ready for placement before the cabinet at its next meeting. That next cabinet meeting has remained elusive for the past 18 months.
Why is the government so helpless in implementing its electoral promises? The stumbling blocks seem to be the security agencies that are averse to accountability and oversight that may expose unspeakable torture and custodial death under their watch.
This conclusion is drawn from the brief submitted about a year ago by the Human Rights Ministry to the Senate Human Rights Committee. According to it, the clauses pertaining to subjecting military-run agencies to proposed legislation have been removed from the draft bill. For instance, a clause in the previous bill reading as under has been deleted by the ministry: “A state of war, threat of war, public emergency, internal political instability or an order of a superior authority or officer shall not constitute a defence against the commission of offences under this act.”
Why is a clause previously endorsed by the Human Rights Ministry in 2015 being opposed by it now? The inference drawn from this volte face is unmistakable.
Recognized and legal places of detention are prisons, judicial and police lock ups. But the emergence of new opaque ‘internment centres’ run by the military has lent torture a new dimension. While there are laws, howsoever ineffective and poorly implemented, against torture at the legal detention centres, the internment centres in erstwhile tribal areas since 2011 are beyond oversight. They have become Abu Ghuraib and Guantanamo Bay-like prisons.
No investigations have been launched into how many disappeared or killed in the internment centres nor in allegations of extracting confession under torture. Worse still, the ordinance producing workshop recently produced another ordinance to set up these torture chambers throughout Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.
The consultation also concluded that in addition to torture, the proposed legislation should also cover other forms of Cruel, Inhuman and Degrading Treatment (CIDT) as required under the UN convention. The law should be applicable to all public officials across the spectrum, not merely the police. The government’s anti-torture legislation has not been made public. However, the reports that it is restricted only to dealing with torture in police custody are worrying.
The Working Group of concerned citizens which eminent human rights activist I.A Rehman announced at the moot must critically examine the proposed government legislation if and when it comes up, that is, against the internationally recognized principles of ending torture and impunity of the crime.
The writer is a former member of the Human Rights Committee of Senate
The conference noted that both state and society are responsible for torture. While state agencies employ torture for extracting confessions and other reasons, the society is complicit for not raising strong voices against it. Torture is inherent in a legal system that retributory instead of reformatory in nature. Calls for public hangings of criminals are a reflection of the attitude towards crime and punishment.
We also live in a state of denial. Look up the official reports submitted to the UN’s human rights bodies periodically. If these reports are to be believed, there is simply no torture in any police lock up or other detention centre in the country. Religion and the Constitution both prohibit torture and degrading a person, and there is no torture anywhere in the country, our official reports seem to claim.
Why is a clause previously endorsed by the Human Rights Ministry in 2015 being opposed by it now?
However, at the last meeting of UN Committee Against Torture sometime back, the shadow report of the independent National Commission on Human Rights (NCHR) of Pakistan, permitted by law to submit its reports, belied unrealistic official claims. Then headed by Justice Chowhan, the NCHR report virtually rebutted all claims made in the official report.
As a result, the NCHR was disbanded at the first available opportunity. No new appointments were made when the term of its chairman and members expired in May last. When the posts were advertised - and the former chairman also was a candidate - the selection process was abruptly suspended. The posts were re-advertised but not before arbitrarily imposing an age limit, not provided for in the original law, so that the former chairman was effectively debarred.
The national consultation recommended enactment of anti-torture legislation. Pakistan signed the Convention Against Torture (CAT) in 2008 and ratified it two years later, in 2010. Ratification of CAT has made it obligatory to make domestic legislation. However, there is no legislation despite unanimous adoption of a private member bill by the Senate in March 2015, also endorsed by the Ministry of Human Rights.
The bill passed by the Senate was sent to the National Assembly which referred it to the relevant committee but could not be passed within the stipulated 90-day period. It was then referred to the joint sitting of the Parliament in January 2017. Nearly three years have passed but it has not been taken up in a joint session of the Parliament.
The present government had promised to immediately bring in anti-torture legislation. However, every time the matter is raised in the human rights committees of Parliament, the standard response of the government is that the draft bill has been finalized and ready for placement before the cabinet at its next meeting. That next cabinet meeting has remained elusive for the past 18 months.
Why is the government so helpless in implementing its electoral promises? The stumbling blocks seem to be the security agencies that are averse to accountability and oversight that may expose unspeakable torture and custodial death under their watch.
This conclusion is drawn from the brief submitted about a year ago by the Human Rights Ministry to the Senate Human Rights Committee. According to it, the clauses pertaining to subjecting military-run agencies to proposed legislation have been removed from the draft bill. For instance, a clause in the previous bill reading as under has been deleted by the ministry: “A state of war, threat of war, public emergency, internal political instability or an order of a superior authority or officer shall not constitute a defence against the commission of offences under this act.”
Why is a clause previously endorsed by the Human Rights Ministry in 2015 being opposed by it now? The inference drawn from this volte face is unmistakable.
Recognized and legal places of detention are prisons, judicial and police lock ups. But the emergence of new opaque ‘internment centres’ run by the military has lent torture a new dimension. While there are laws, howsoever ineffective and poorly implemented, against torture at the legal detention centres, the internment centres in erstwhile tribal areas since 2011 are beyond oversight. They have become Abu Ghuraib and Guantanamo Bay-like prisons.
No investigations have been launched into how many disappeared or killed in the internment centres nor in allegations of extracting confession under torture. Worse still, the ordinance producing workshop recently produced another ordinance to set up these torture chambers throughout Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.
The consultation also concluded that in addition to torture, the proposed legislation should also cover other forms of Cruel, Inhuman and Degrading Treatment (CIDT) as required under the UN convention. The law should be applicable to all public officials across the spectrum, not merely the police. The government’s anti-torture legislation has not been made public. However, the reports that it is restricted only to dealing with torture in police custody are worrying.
The Working Group of concerned citizens which eminent human rights activist I.A Rehman announced at the moot must critically examine the proposed government legislation if and when it comes up, that is, against the internationally recognized principles of ending torture and impunity of the crime.
The writer is a former member of the Human Rights Committee of Senate