The Response of the Pakistani Government
In response to international and domestic pressure, the Pakistani government has initiated some measures to address the problem of widespread abuses against women. These steps, while welcome, will do little to curb these abuses unless the government takes effective action to hold its own police andother security forces accountable for torture, rape and illegal detention, and change the laws under which women are wrongfully detained.
For more than twelve years, human rights and women's rights advocates in Pakistan have been campaigning for the repeal of discriminatory laws, including the Hudood Ordinances, good faith prosecution of abusive police, greater adherence to the fundamental principles of due process and equality before the law, and increased legal services for women. Some members of Pakistan's judiciary, particularly at the High Court level, have recognized the epidemic proportions of violence against women in custody and have initiated investigations.
Late in 1994, the Senate set up a commission of inquiry for women, headed by a Supreme Court judge and including senators and prominent private citizens, to examine the laws that discriminate against women and to suggest amendments and other remedial measures. At the same time, a tribunal was established to look into abuses against disadvantaged segments of the populace, including women. It is too soon to tell whether these bodies have had any effect in ameliorating conditions for women.
Police stations staffed entirely by women police officers were functioning in several cities in Pakistan by the end of 1994. The stations are tasked to deal with cases in which women have been the principal victims. In 1994 the government also passed a law prohibiting the detention of women in police stations for questioning, except in cases of murder or robbery. Under this law, the police are required to take women directly into judicial custody. However, it remains to be seen whether these laws will be observed in practice. Police regulations prohibiting the overnight detention of women were on the books for years and were frequently disregarded.
Despite these welcome measures, the government's response remains woefully inadequate. While the government gained media attention in 1994 for prosecuting one man, Maulvi Mohammad Sharif, in a case in which he was charged with inserting electrified iron rods into his wife's vagina, it did not seek to implement legislative reforms to protect women. The Hudood Ordinances, as applied in Pakistan, continue explicitly to discriminate against women.
Pakistan is obliged under international law and its own constitution to refrain from torture and ill-treatment of prisoners in custody and to provide female victims of such abuse with equal protection under the law. But the government has failed to eliminate the overtly discriminatory laws and practices that promote the wrongful prosecution of women and result in their prolonged imprisonment. And, rather than remove procedural obstacles tojustice for the victims of police abuse, the government has adopted policies that perpetuate police impunity and erode judicial independence.31
As Pakistan bids to be a significant regional and international power, the government must take immediate steps to adopt and adhere to international human rights standards and to end all forms of violence against women and gender discrimination. Its failure to do so will only perpetuate the oppression of women in Pakistan and further diminish the country's stature as a nascent democracy in the eyes of the international community.
31 Despite the government's stated intention to eliminate custodial violence and gender discrimination, it has yet to ratify most of the relevant international human rights instruments, including the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women. Although Pakistan is a signatory to the Convention for the Suppression of the Traffic in Persons, it has largely failed to meet its obligations under this agreement.
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