Pakistan’s minorities face relentless persecution amid violence and forced conversions

Washington, Aug 22 (IANS) Fifteen years after the assassination of Shahbaz Bhatti – Pakistan’s first Catholic federal minister for minorities and a prominent champion of religious freedom, minority communities including Christians -Hindus and Ahmadis continue to face discrimination and attacks on places of worship across the country. The abuses also include abductions, forced conversions and child marriages, alongside the misuse of the country’s blasphemy laws, a report has stated.

These persistent abuses stand in stark violation of Pakistan’s constitutional promise of equal citizenship, Turkish journalist Uzay Bulut wrote in American media outlet ‘PJ Media’.

“August 11 was declared in Pakistan the official ‘National Minorities Day’ in 2009 in response to a campaign led by Shahbaz Bhatti, Pakistan’s first Catholic federal minister for minorities and a prominent advocate for religious freedom. The date commemorates Muhammad Ali Jinnah’s historic address to Pakistan’s Constituent Assembly on August 11, 1947, in which the country’s founder declared that citizens were free to practice their religion and that faith should have no bearing on equal citizenship,” Bulut stated.

“Bhatti was assassinated in Islamabad on March 2, 2011, for his vocal opposition to Pakistan’s blasphemy laws. Those laws carry the death penalty for insulting Islam or Mohammed. Two assassins sprayed the Christian minister’s car with gunfire, striking him at least eight times, before scattering pamphlets that described him as a ‘Christian infidel’. The leaflets were signed ‘Taliban al-Qaida Punjab’,” Bulut added.

According to the report, the killing of Bhatti came two months after the assassination of Punjab Governor Salmaan Taseer, who had also criticised the misuse of blasphemy laws.

Last week, several members of religious minority communities and civil society activists took part in the annual Minority Rights March in three major Pakistani cities marking Pakistan’s National Minorities Day.

The protesters urged the government to criminalise forced conversions and amend personal laws governing interfaith marriages to safeguard the rights of minority spouses and children.

They also called for the acceptance of their 11-point charter of demands, including stronger safeguards against forced conversions and protection from the misuse of blasphemy laws.

In Karachi, more than 2,000 protesters gathered at Jinnah’s mausoleum, holding placards that read “My religion, my will” and displaying photographs of victims of mob lynchings, forced conversions, blasphemy-related violence and the assassination of Christian leaders, PJ Media report highlighted.

Citing the 2026 annual report of the US Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF), it said that the commission had recommended redesignating Pakistan as a Country of Particular Concern (CPC) over “systematic, ongoing, and egregious violations of religious freedom.”

The USCIRF called on the US government to “impose targeted sanctions on Pakistani officials and government agencies responsible for severe violations of religious freedom by freezing those individuals’ assets and/or barring their entry into the United States under human rights-related financial and visa authorities, citing specific religious freedom violations; and to enter into a binding agreement with the Pakistani government, under Section 405(c) of IRFA [the International Religious Freedom Act], to encourage substantial steps to address violations of freedom of religion or belief (FoRB).”

–IANS

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