The US Commission on International Religious Freedom has come down hard on Pakistan for its wave of targeted religious violence, claiming more than 700 lives in the last 18 months.
Shias, Ahmadis, Christians, Hindus and Sikhs have all been victims of the targeted violence in varying degrees. The Shia community has borne the brunt of the religious violence, accounting for 635 of the 717 killed in the attacks. Of the 203 attacks chronicled by the commission, Shias were targeted in 77 attacks, followed by Ahmadis (54), Christians (37), Hindus (16) and Sikhs (3) and other groups (16). The list of casualties states that 22 Ahmadis, 11 Christians, 2 Hindus and one Sikh were among those killed.
The majority of rape cases were against Hindu women, mostly young girls (seven cases), followed by Christians (five). The Hindu victims include a six-year-old girl in Umerkot district of Sindh, two girls aged 14 and 15 from Jacobabad, Sindh, a 17-year-old girl from Mirpur Mathelo, Sindh, a 29-year-old woman from Karachi and another woman from Rahimyar Khan, Punjab. In all these cases, the victims had been abducted, forced to convert to Islam and marry Muslim men, said a fact sheet issued by the commission.
“While Shias are more at risk of becoming victims of suicide bombings and targeted shootings, the already poor religious freedom environment for Christians, Ahmadis, and Hindus continued to deteriorate, with a number violent incidents occurring against members of these communities,” said the commission, which has instituted what it calls the “Pakistan Religious Violence Project”.
Tracking the publicly-reported attacks over the past 18 months, the commission said: “The findings are sobering: 203 incidents of sectarian violence resulting in more than 1,800 casualties, including over 700 deaths.”
“The project’s findings paint a grim and challenging picture for the new government of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif,” it said. While welcoming Sharif’s expression of concern over religious minorities in his address to the National Assembly, it stressed that concrete action is needed to ensure that perpetrators are arrested, prosecuted and jailed.
“To stem the rising tide of violent religious extremism, groups and individuals responsible for attacks on religious communities must be punished,” the report said and criticized the police for turning a blind eye to mob attacks and other offences when victims are found to be religious minorities. It noted that “the climate of impunity threatening all Pakistanis, regardless of their faith, also is exacerbated by the muchabused blasphemy and anti-Ahmadi laws”.