Wednesday, December 4, 2019
Balochistan: Pakistan military abduct 18 people including women and children from Awaran and Dera Bugti
Pakistan military and FC have abducted at least 18 people including eight women and children from Balochistan’s Awaran and Dera Bugti districts in past few days.
According to details, Pakistan Army has abducted four Baloch women and a boy, who is the son of one of the abducted women in two separate offensives in Balochistan’s Awaran district. separate illegal raids in the Awaran district of Balochistan.
Local sources reported that Pakistan FC and intelligence agencies attacked the victims’ house in Haroni Dunn area of Awaran on Friday night.
Global media watchdogs calls on Pakistani authorities to condemn besieging of Dawn offices
Global media watchdogs — Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) and Reporters Without Borders (RSF) — have called on Pakistani authorities to condemn the besieging of Dawn offices in Islamabad and to prevent demonstrations against the newspaper from turning violent.
A few dozen unidentified people on Monday had staged a protest outside Dawn offices in the capital over the publication of a news report regarding the Pakistani origins of the London Bridge attacker who stabbed two persons to death last week.
The charged mob, carrying banners and chanting slogans against the newspaper, remained outside the office building for nearly three hours, besieging the premises and making the staffers hostage. Security guards at the media house had to lock the gates to prevent the protesters from entering the premises before police and officers of the capital administration arrived.
A day later, dozens of people staged a protest outside Karachi Press Club against Dawn and made threats against its staffers. They also threatened to besiege the offices of the media group if “prompt action was not taken against the management and outlets of the organisation for publishing false news.”
“Pakistanis have every right to object to and demonstrate against the Dawn newspaper over its coverage, but threatening violence steps way over the line,” said Kathleen Carroll, CPJ’s board chair, in a statement issued on Tuesday. “We call on Pakistani authorities to take all appropriate measures to ensure the safety of Dawn’s staff.”
Daniel Bastard, the head of RSF’s Asia-Pacific desk, also condemned the incident, saying: “This show of force constitutes yet another absolutely unacceptable act of intimidation towards Pakistan’s leading daily.”
“The information we have obtained indicates that the federal government was, at the very least, a passive accomplice if not the actual instigator of behaviour that is unacceptable in a democracy," said the RSF statement. "We call on Prime Minister Imran Khan to publicly condemn these excesses, failing which he will be held personally responsible for this alarming press freedom violation.”
The statement by RSF also mentioned the tweets by two federal ministers — Fawad Chaudhry and Shireen Mazari — who on Sunday had criticised the Dawn report.
The International Press Institute (IPI), in a tweet posted on Wednesday, said it was "appalled at the serious threats against Dawn in Pakistan, specifically targetting its CEO and its editor".
"It is even more disturbing as they appear to have been driven by government ministers’ and ruling party leaders’ vocal criticism of the newspaper coverage," IPI said further.
See IPI's other Tweets
Condemnations
Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) Chairman Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari on Tuesday visited Dawn offices in Islamabad to express solidarity with its staffers and condemned besieging of the Dawn offices, saying it was an attempt to pressuring the media.
“Media organisations are being threatened but we will not allow anyone to curb freedom of press,” Bilawal had said. “It is a black day in the history of the country that Dawn offices have been attacked in the capital in such a manner.”
Chairman of the Senate Functional Committee on Human Rights Mustafa Nawaz Kokhar also took notice of the besieging of Dawn and directed the inspector general of police Islamabad to submit a report on the issue to the committee by December 6.
PML-N Information Secretary Marriyum Aurangzeb called for a high-level investigation into the incident to identify and punish the perpetrators. “Such actions are unacceptable in any civilised society,” she said, pledging that the people, politicians and media will join hands in the fight against such elements.
National Party (NP) Punjab president Ayub Malik had termed it as an “attack on media freedom”.
Pakistan Federal Union of Journalists, Council of Pakistan Newspapers Editors, All-Pakistan Newspapers Employees Confederation, Media Workers Organisation and National Press Club also condemned the incident.
Pakistan Backs Off Prosecuting Chinese Sex Traffickers to Preserve Economic Ties to Beijing: Report
ZACHARY EVANS
Pakistan has declined to pursue a sprawling case against Chinese sex traffickers due to fears it would harm economic ties with Beijing, the AP reported on Wednesday.
Pakistan has been seeking closer ties with China for years as Beijing continue to make major investments in the country’s infrastructure.
Pakistani investigators have compiled a list of 629 girls and women who were brought to China to be sold as brides. Traffickers often target members of Pakistan’s Christian minority, one of the poorest communities in the Muslim-majority country, and some even bribe ministers to advise churchgoers to sell their daughters.
A senior Pakistani official said that many of the women who have spoken to the authorities have reported physical and sexual abuse while in China, as well as forced prostitution and fertility treatments. One investigation even contains allegations the organs of some of the women were harvested in China, although there is no evidence for the allegations as of yet.
Those familiar with the case said Pakistani authorities are quashing the investigations, in some cases even transferring investigators to different areas.
“No one is doing anything to help these girls,” another official told the AP. “The whole racket is continuing, and it is growing. Why? Because they know they can get away with it. The authorities won’t follow through, everyone is being pressured to not investigate. Trafficking is increasing now.”
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A case against 31 Chinese nationals accused of human trafficking fell apart in October when a court acquitted all of them. Several women brought by police to testify were bribed or threatened to remain silent.
AP Exclusive: 629 Pakistani girls sold as brides to China
By KATHY GANNON
The list gives the most concrete figure yet for the number of women caught up in the trafficking schemes since 2018.
But since the time it was put together in June, investigators’ aggressive drive against the networks has largely ground to a halt. Officials with knowledge of the investigations say that is because of pressure from government officials fearful of hurting Pakistan’s lucrative ties to Beijing.
The biggest case against traffickers has fallen apart. In October, a court in Faisalabad acquitted 31 Chinese nationals charged in connection with trafficking. Several of the women who had initially been interviewed by police refused to testify because they were either threatened or bribed into silence, according to a court official and a police investigator familiar with the case. The two spoke on condition of anonymity because they feared retribution for speaking out.
At the same time, the government has sought to curtail investigations, putting “immense pressure” on officials from the Federal Investigation Agency pursuing trafficking networks, said Saleem Iqbal, a Christian activist who has helped parents rescue several young girls from China and prevented others from being sent there.
“Some (FIA officials) were even transferred,” Iqbal said in an interview. “When we talk to Pakistani rulers, they don’t pay any attention. “
Asked about the complaints, Pakistan’s interior and foreign ministries refused to comment.
Several senior officials familiar with the events said investigations into trafficking have slowed, the investigators are frustrated, and Pakistani media have been pushed to curb their reporting on trafficking. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they feared reprisals.
“No one is doing anything to help these girls,” one of the officials said. “The whole racket is continuing, and it is growing. Why? Because they know they can get away with it. The authorities won’t follow through, everyone is being pressured to not investigate. Trafficking is increasing now.”
He said he was speaking out “because I have to live with myself. Where is our humanity?”
China’s Foreign Ministry said it was unaware of the list.
“The two governments of China and Pakistan support the formation of happy families between their people on a voluntary basis in keeping with laws and regulations, while at the same time having zero tolerance for and resolutely fighting against any person engaging in illegal cross-border marriage behavior,” the ministry said in a statement faxed Monday to AP’s Beijing bureau.
An AP investigation earlier this year revealed how Pakistan’s Christian minority has become a new target of brokers who pay impoverished parents to marry off their daughters, some of them teenagers, to Chinese husbands who return with them to their homeland. Many of the brides are then isolated and abused or forced into prostitution in China, often contacting home and pleading to be brought back. The AP spoke to police and court officials and more than a dozen brides — some of whom made it back to Pakistan, others who remained trapped in China — as well as remorseful parents, neighbors, relatives and human rights workers.
Christians are targeted because they are one of the poorest communities in Muslim-majority Pakistan. The trafficking rings are made up of Chinese and Pakistani middlemen and include Christian ministers, mostly from small evangelical churches, who get bribes to urge their flock to sell their daughters. Investigators have also turned up at least one Muslim cleric running a marriage bureau from his madrassa, or religious school.
Investigators put together the list of 629 women from Pakistan’s integrated border management system, which digitally records travel documents at the country’s airports. The information includes the brides’ national identity numbers, their Chinese husbands’ names and the dates of their marriages.
All but a handful of the marriages took place in 2018 and up to April 2019. One of the senior officials said it was believed all 629 were sold to grooms by their families.
It is not known how many more women and girls were trafficked since the list was put together. But the official said, “the lucrative trade continues.” He spoke to the AP in an interview conducted hundreds of kilometers from his place of work to protect his identity. “The Chinese and Pakistani brokers make between 4 million and 10 million rupees ($25,000 and $65,000) from the groom, but only about 200,000 rupees ($1,500), is given to the family,” he said.
The official, with years of experience studying human trafficking in Pakistan, said many of the women who spoke to investigators told of forced fertility treatments, physical and sexual abuse and, in some cases, forced prostitution. Although no evidence has emerged, at least one investigation report contains allegations of organs being harvested from some of the women sent to China.
In September, Pakistan’s investigation agency sent a report it labeled “fake Chinese marriages cases” to Prime Minister Imran Khan. The report, a copy of which was attained by the AP, provided details of cases registered against 52 Chinese nationals and 20 of their Pakistani associates in two cities in eastern Punjab province — Faisalabad, Lahore — as well as in the capital Islamabad. The Chinese suspects included the 31 later acquitted in court.
The report said police discovered two illegal marriage bureaus in Lahore, including one operated from an Islamic center and madrassa — the first known report of poor Muslims also being targeted by brokers. The Muslim cleric involved fled police.
After the acquittals, there are other cases before the courts involving arrested Pakistani and at least another 21 Chinese suspects, according to the report sent to the prime minister in September. But the Chinese defendants in the cases were all granted bail and left the country, say activists and a court official. Activists and human rights workers say Pakistan has sought to keep the trafficking of brides quiet so as not to jeopardize Pakistan’s increasingly close economic relationship with China.
China has been a steadfast ally of Pakistan for decades, particularly in its testy relationship with India. China has provided Islamabad with military assistance, including pre-tested nuclear devices and nuclear-capable missiles.
Today, Pakistan is receiving massive aid under China’s Belt and Road Initiative, a global endeavor aimed at reconstituting the Silk Road and linking China to all corners of Asia. Under the $75 billion China-Pakistan Economic Corridor project, Beijing has promised Islamabad a sprawling package of infrastructure development, from road construction and power plants to agriculture.
The demand for foreign brides in China is rooted in that country’s population, where there are roughly 34 million more men than women — a result of the one-child policy that ended in 2015 after 35 years, along with an overwhelming preference for boys that led to abortions of girl children and female infanticide.A report released this month by Human Rights Watch, documenting trafficking in brides from Myanmar to China, said the practice is spreading. It said Pakistan, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Myanmar, Nepal, North Korea and Vietnam have “all have become source countries for a brutal business.”“One of the things that is very striking about this issue is how fast the list is growing of countries that are known to be source countries in the bride trafficking business,” Heather Barr, the HRW report’s author, told AP.Omar Warriach, Amnesty International’s campaigns director for South Asia, said Pakistan “must not let its close relationship with China become a reason to turn a blind eye to human rights abuses against its own citizens” — either in abuses of women sold as brides or separation of Pakistani women from husbands from China’s Muslim Uighur population sent to “re-education camps” to turn them away from Islam.
“It is horrifying that women are being treated this way without any concern being shown by the authorities in either country. And it’s shocking that it’s happening on this scale,” he said.