UN experts demanded Pakistan take “immediate steps” to act against the sudden rise in forced religious conversion of underage minority community women.
The UN Rights Experts
The experts, including 12 special rapporteurs and independent experts, are independent of the UN and do not receive any salaries from the international institution.
The experts’ opinion was published by the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR). It raised concern about the increase in incidents of underage women being kidnapped and trafficked across the country to marry older men after being forced to convert to Islam.
The UN release said these activities violate Pakistani laws and Islamabad’s international human rights commitments. “Perpetrators must be held fully accountable,” the release demanded.
UN experts express alarm at rise in abductions, forced marriages & conversions of underage girls and young women from religious minorities in Pakistan. Statement: pic.twitter.com/pAVLQAMWvm
— Sidhant Sibal (@sidhant) January 16, 2023
While the experts acknowledged Islamabad’s attempts to pass laws to protect minorities and prevent forceful conversions, the victims and their families are barred from securing justice. The authorities often accept false documentation and evidence about the age of the victims and their consent to marry and convert.
Concerningly, the OHCHR release lamented that these forced conversions and abductions are orchestrated with the help of religious authorities and security officials. In fact, it said that the courts have often relied on distorted religious interpretations and permitted the victims to remain with the abusers.
Religious Rights in Pakistan
Domestic and international rights groups have often raised concerns about minority religious rights in Pakistan, particularly those of poorer communities. Hundreds of incidents of forced conversions of Hindu girls are reported each year, with a majority in the Sindh province, which houses 90% of the Hindu community.
Voice for Justice & @JubileeC released a report on Conversion without Consent, forced marriages, sexual abuse & abduction of minor religious minority girls & women in #Pakistan@petervdalen @weimers @MargaPisa @FidanzaCarlo @FoRB_EuroParl
— Joseph Janssen (@JosephjansenVFJ) December 9, 2022
Report Linkhttps://t.co/euLpP0xdjV pic.twitter.com/TQ78XnAVdM
In December, a Christian rights group, Voice for Justice, collaborated with the international rights organisation Jubilee Campaign and published a report titled “Conversion without Consent.” It looked into 100 incidents of abductions, conversions, forced child marriages, and other crimes against the Christian minority community.
However, Pakistan has failed to act against the issue. In October 2021, a Parliamentary Committee rejected a proposal to introduce a 10-year jail term for those convicted of forced conversions. Over recent years, several places of worship of Hindus and Sikhs have been attacked, including the January 2020 attack on the Mata Rani Bhatiyani Mandir and Gurdwara Sri Janamsthan, and the December 2020 attack on the Hindu Temple in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. In August 2021, a mob burned down parts of a Hindu temple and damaged several idols in the Bhong town of Rahim Yar Khan in Pakistan’s Punjab province amid rising communal tensions.
Hindus and Christians account for 2% and 1.5%, respectively, of Pakistan’s 220 million population and are some of the significant minority religious groups in the country.