Knowing your rights is the first step towards protecting them. At our workshop in Multan, lawyers, journalists, activists and civil society representatives engaged with field experts and human rights practitioners to deepen their understanding of fundamental rights, international human rights treaties, and the legal remedies available when rights are violated. Our discussions connected international human rights standards with the legal and practical tools available to people seeking justice, giving participants a stronger foundation to advocate for rights in their own communities. @CanHCPakistan

HRCP strongly condemns the abduction of 20 trainee police personnel in Mastung on 16 October and the killing of two police constables in Nasirabad on 17 October in Balochistan. Both incidents demonstrate the deteriorating security situation and the growing risks faced by public officials and ordinary citizens. We urge the authorities to secure the safe recovery of the abducted personnel and ensure a credible investigation into both incidents such that the perpetrators are held to account. However, we would also remind the state that kinetic measures alone cannot deliver lasting peace. Rather, the state must urgently initiate meaningful political dialogue with all stakeholders in Balochistan, particularly civil society, and address the province’s long-standing grievances, including protecting the rights of local communities over their own resources.

HRCP is appalled by the deaths of at least 30 children and a teacher, who were killed at the Al-Khair School in Afridi Abad, Peshawar, when the building's roof collapsed. It is important to stress that this was not an accident but a preventable failure, given that police have reportedly attributed the collapse to a weak structure carrying excessive construction. HRCP notes that a similar incident this year killed 14 children at a Lahore tuition centre. We call for an independent, time-bound inquiry, with the findings made public as well as for accountability of the school owner and of the regulators who allowed unsafe buildings to operate, compensation for the affected families, and mandatory structural audits of all public and private schools.

🔴 Press release   HRCP report questions state’s commitment to equal citizenship for minorities   15 October 2026, Lahore. A report released earlier today by the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP) has welcomed the passage of the National Commission for Minorities Act 2025 and child marriage restraint laws raising the minimum age for marriage to 18 in Punjab and Balochistan. However, the report also warns that these important steps towards protecting religious minorities are in stark contrast to persistent violations of freedom of religion or belief (FORB), including the weaponisation of blasphemy laws, forced marriages and conversions, escalating hate speech, and the state’s failure to ensure equal citizenship.   Sanctuary Denied: Freedom of religion or belief in 2025/26, HRCP’s seventh annual report on this subject, points out that the National Commission for Minorities Act remains unimplemented months after its passage, with the commission yet to be constituted. Meanwhile, hundreds of people accused of blasphemy remain in legal limbo, and the alleged perpetrators of an organised entrapment network have yet to be investigated. The report also documents attacks on the Ahmadiyya community, including two extremist attacks in Chenab Nagar, alongside increasingly overt attempts to exclude Ahmadis from public and commercial life.   Girls from Christian and Hindu communities continued to face abduction and forced marriage, compounded by poverty and inadequate police responses. Discriminatory employment practices, the Islamisation of school curricula and the marginalisation of minority concerns in mainstream media further undermine equal citizenship. The report urges the federal government to operationalise the National Commission for Minorities Act without further delay, investigate alleged blasphemy entrapment networks and hold accountable those who incite violence against minorities. It also calls for stronger safeguards against forced conversions and underage marriages, mandatory FORB training for law-enforcement agencies, and effective protection for human rights defenders, lawyers and journalists. Khyber Pakhtunkhwa must also enact legislation setting the minimum marriageable age at 18 for all.   Speaking at the report launch, HRCP director @farahziaa warned that the state’s approach to religious minorities was increasingly exclusionary. Minority rights defender @NabilaFBhatti drew attention to the case of Kamran Gill, a Christian medical practitioner from Sheikhupura, whose dispensary was set ablaze by a mob on 9 October following allegations that he had shared blasphemous content on social media. HRCP Punjab vice-chair Raja Ashraf warned that blasphemy accusations had become a means of exploiting and endangering vulnerable people.   Describing the severe restrictions on Ahmadis’ freedom of expression and assembly, community representative @IamAmirMahmood recalled that the community’s last public gathering had taken place more than 40 years ago. Shehri Pakistan director @ArafatMazhar cautioned that in ongoing blasphemy cases, the public must consult the accused’s lawyers and allow the courts to determine the appropriate legal procedure, rather than turning accused individuals into symbols of the wider debate over blasphemy laws. Former HRCP chairperson Hina Jilani, highlighting the institutional nature of discrimination against minorities, reminded the audience that ‘Democracy should have no concept of “minority” and “majority”.’ Asad Iqbal Butt Chairperson The report can be accessed here: tinyurl.com/5n83s9h9

Urban development... but for whom? The demolition drives by the @CDAthecapital, targeting informal settlements and low-income communities in Islamabad earlier this year, continue to raise serious concerns about the right to housing, due process and the protection of vulnerable communities. Those residents who were evicted lost not only their homes but also lives they had spent years building. Those who were spared, on the strength of a 2015 Supreme Court stay order against summary evictions of katchi abadis, still live in fear of the rumble of bulldozers. #righttoshelter #righttohousing

Join us in Lahore on Thursday 15 October 2026 as we launch our annual report on the state of freedom of religion or belief in 2025/26.

HRCP cautions the federal government and Parliament that declaring an emergency or imposing governor’s rule in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa risks further deepening political tensions and undermining democratic processes. We strongly urge the federal government and the PTI to resume a meaningful political dialogue immediately and ensure that citizens' fundamental rights are not suspended under any pretext.

The right to a fair trial means little if a wrongful death sentence cannot be corrected before it is carried out. Pakistan’s justice system must account for the possibility of error when the consequences are irreversible. On World Day against the Death Penalty, HRCP urges the state to sustain at the very least the moratorium on executions and carry out meaningful reforms to ensure that justice does not come too late.

Does the threat of death actually deter crime, or does it distract us from the deeper failures of our criminal justice system? On this World Day against the Death Penalty, Pakistan’s reliance on capital punishment raises an important question: are we addressing the roots of crime or simply punishing its consequences?

جہدِ حق کا اکتوبر کا شمارہ شائع ہو چکا ہے: tinyurl.com/3jxywuzk اس ماہ کے ایچ آر سی پی کے نیوز لیٹر میں ہم آپ کے لیے توجہ طلب انسانی حقوق کے مسائل، فیلڈ رپورٹس، ایڈووکیسی کی سرگرمیوں اور زمینی حقائق سے جڑی آوازوں سے متعلق تازہ ترین خبریں لے کر آئے ہیں۔ اس شمارے میں شامل ہیں: سزائے موت کے خلاف چوبیسواں عالمی دن: زندگی کی کہانیاں پاکستان سے افغان طلبہ کی بے دخلی کا فیصلہ واپس لیا جائے: قانونی برادری، ماہرین تعلیم اور سول سوسائی کا مطالبہ پنجاب دہشت گردی کے مقدمات کے لیے بے چہرہ، خفیہ ٹرائلز چاہتا ہے جمہوریہ کے نگہبان: پاکستان میں جمہوریت کو زندہ رکھنے والے مرد و خواتین 17 ہزار چیخیں اور 6 فیصد انصاف: جب گلگت بلتستان بھی محفوظ نہ رہا

HRCP is deeply concerned by reports that an additional sessions judge, Asadullah Raisani, has gone missing while travelling from Quetta to Panjgur. According to family sources, Justice Raisani left Quetta for Panjgur on 6 October 2026, but contact with him was lost while he was en route in Surab. We call on the authorities to ascertain his whereabouts and keep his family informed of all developments. Given the serious security situation in Balochistan, the authorities must treat the reported disappearance as a matter of utmost urgency and take all necessary measures to locate Justice Raisani safely.

Nearly 3 in 4 people in Pakistan's prisons have not been convicted of any crime. Researched by @LegalPolitical and @saramalkani, our policy paper, Beyond the Prison Wall, finds that under-trial prisoners comprised over 73 percent of the prison population in 2024, up from 66 percent in 2017. Prisons nationwide hold 152 percent of their official capacity. But building more jails is not the answer. Overcrowding persists because the problem lies in the justice system, not in a shortage of cells. The bail framework is ineffective, investigations and trials drag on interminably, and pre-trial detention is the default rather than the exception. What the policy paper recommends: ✅ Reform bail law so that it respects the presumption of innocence, with police and prosecutors, not the accused, required to justify detention. ✅ Bar pre-trial detention for offences carrying short sentences, and expand alternatives such as release on personal recognisance and supervision. ✅ Enforce bail as a right when the statutory delay is exceeded, and give the accused access to the evidence against them at the bail stage. ✅ Make prosecution independent, and have it withdraw cases with no realistic chance of conviction. ✅ Allow people to seek compensation for time wrongly spent behind bars. ✅ Make probation and parole a legal right, backed by trained officers and rehabilitation services. ✅ Publish prison data proactively and set up an independent body to oversee prisons. Overcrowding is not just a matter of space. It means disease, violence and lost years for people who may be innocent. Read the full paper: tinyurl.com/59cbtbue #prisonreforms #overcrowding @EUPakistan

The right to health remains missing from Pakistan’s Constitution as an explicit fundamental right, even though it has ratified the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, which recognises under Article 12 the right of everyone to the highest attainable standard of physical and mental health. A functioning healthcare system is not a privilege. It is essential to the right to life and the right to dignity recognised by the Constitution.