The Universal
Periodic Review (UPR) Working Group’s 14th session is scheduled to
take place from October 22 to November 5, 2012 in Human Rights Council, Geneva,
Switzerland. Pakistan’s review is scheduled from 09:00 to 12:30 hours on
Tuesday October 30, 2012 while the report on Pakistan will be adopted on Friday
November 02, 2012. The UPR is a United Nations review mechanism of the overall
human rights situation of all UN Member States, by all UN Member States. This
includes child rights issues.
The review is based
on three reports: 1) the State’s national report, 2) a compilation of UN
information on the State prepared by the Office of the High Commissioner
(OHCHR) and 3) a summary of other relevant stakeholders’ information, including
NGOs’, prepared by the OHCHR. From Pakistan a number of stakeholders’ reports
have been submitted by different civil society organizations focusing on
different areas such as human rights, women’s rights, minorities’ situation,
labour rights, right to information and child rights. I’ll briefly discuss the
concerns and recommendations raised by the Child Rights Movement (CRM), a coalition
of 108 national and international organizations working for child rights in
Pakistan in its report.
The CRM report highlights the fact that there is no an
independent body at the federal level with a statutory status for reporting,
coordination and monitoring for the implementation of the United Nations
Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC) and its Optional Protocols and
have recommended that the Government of Pakistan should establish an
independent National Commission on the Rights of Children (NCRC) by passing the
long pending NCRC bill.
While highlighting
the issue of malnutrition, the civil society report states that malnutrition is
contributing to 35 percent of all under-5 deaths in Pakistan. According to
UNICEF, 32 percent of infants have low birth-weight (recorded in 2006 and
2010). In 2010, the infant mortality rate was 70/1000 and under-5 mortality
rate was 87/1000. As a result, Pakistan is at risk of failing to reach its MDGs
targets on maternal and child health. Pakistan should take all legislative,
administrative and other appropriate measures to develop and implement
comprehensive food security and malnutrition prevention and response programmes
recommended the CRM.
The report further states that Pakistan has
ratified three conventions related to children: UNCRC and ILO’s Conventions 138
(the Minimum Age Convention) and 182 (Convention on the Worst Forms of Child
Labour) however, little progress has been made in amending existing or
introducing new legislation to comply with the provisions of these conventions.
The report also highlights cases of severe torture and abuse of child domestic
workers. The civil society report recommends that Pakistan should introduce new
laws and where required amend existing laws to implement the provisions of
these conventions and to ban child domestic labour under the Employment of
Children Act (ECA) 1991.
The report also highlights child protection issues
like corporal punishment and child marriages and recommended to immediately
enact the long awaited Prohibition of Corporal Punishment and the Child
Marriages Restraint (Amendment) Bills to prohibit corporal punishment in all
its forms and raise the minimum marriageable age for girls from 16 to 18 years,
along with strict penalties for violations.
The CRM report highlighted stark statistics
related to the number of child sexual abuse cases (1,839 in 2008, 2,012 in
2009, 2,595 in 2010): On average, six children are sexually assaulted every
day, but reported cases are only a fraction of all cases due to social taboo. CRM
recommends that Pakistan should ensure that professionals working on the front
line with children, such as teachers, medical professionals, school counselors,
and police personnel, are sensitized and trained to appropriately respond to
child sexual abuse, including prevention, detection and management.
There are an estimated 1.2 million children
living and or working on the streets in major cities of Pakistan. Following the
floods in 2010 and 2011, and ongoing conflict in the tribal areas, there has
been a surge of street children. The federal and provincial governments in Pakistan
should support mechanisms for rehabilitation and reunification of children
living and or working on the streets recommended the CRM.
The civil society report further states that
the Juvenile Justice System Ordinance (JJSO), 2000, is little recognized or
known among law enforcement agencies, and officials are generally not
sensitized or qualified to deal with children’s issues. Furthermore, the law
does not override, but is in addition to, several laws such as the Army Act, Frontier Crimes Regulation,
Action (in Aid Civil Power) Regulation, Anti-terrorism Act, Control of
Narcotics Substance Act, Punjab Prohibition of Kite Flying Ordinance and the
Railways Act to name a few. Under these laws, harsh punishments including death
sentence and life imprisonment can be imposed upon children. The Government of Pakistan
should take measures to ensure that the JJSO overrides other laws in cases
involving children and take solid steps for the implementation of the JJSO
including the establishment of exclusive juvenile courts, appointment of
probation officers and budgetary allocation.
Similarly, the minimum age for criminal
responsibility that currently stands at 7 years under Section 82 of the
Pakistan Penal Code (PPC) should be increased immediately to an internationally
accepted level i.e. 12 years. A Child Protection Criminal Laws (Amendment) Bill
has been pending since 2009 in which the minimum age of criminal responsibility
was proposed to increase from 7 to 10 years under Section 82 and from 12 to 14 years under Section 83 of
the PPPC.
National birth registration average is at a
dismal 29.5 percent as Pakistan has not taken sufficient measures to remove
structural obstacles to birth registration and harmonize birth registration
systems across the country. The CRM recommended that Pakistan should take legal
and administrative measures to remove obstacles to birth registration
(particularly for marginalized segments of society, e.g. single parents
children, children out of wedlock, street children and orphans) and harmonize
laws related to birth registration across the country by 2015.
While highlighting the state of education in
the country, the report stated that about 7 million children are not attending
primary school in Pakistan; approximately 60 percent of these are girls.
Accordingly, more than 50 million Pakistanis above 10 years of age are
illiterate. Through a positive constitutional amendment Article 25A was
inserted in the Constitution of Pakistan in 2010, where education has been made
a fundamental right of every child from 5 to 16 years of age however; neither the
federal nor provincial governments have introduced laws to implement the
Article. Both the federal and provincial legislature should enact laws Pakistan
that should comply with Article 25-A (the Right to Education).
Pakistan ratified the Optional Protocol to the UNCRC
on Sale of Children, Child Prostitution and Child Pornography in October 2011;
however, the Child Protection (Criminal Law) Amendment Bill 2009, which would
provide for preventive and protective measures against sale of children, child
prostitution and child pornography is still pending to be placed before the
National Assembly of Pakistan for enactment. Pakistan should translate
ratification of the Optional Protocol on Sale of Children, Child Prostitution
and Child Pornography into national laws.
Pakistan has introduced the Action in Aid for
Civil Power Regulations (AACPRs) for the Federally Administrated Tribal Areas
and Provincially Administrated Tribal Areas. These regulations allow for the
confinement of an individual for 120 days without the authority of the
magistrate. Furthermore, the Regulations state that for 120 days, there will be
no legal representation or trial, and a single statement by an official from
the Law Enforcement Agencies is sufficient to prove a suspect guilty of an
offence and set a death sentence, which cannot be challenged at any other legal
forum. Pakistan
should immediately abolish the AACPRs and proper administrative and judicial
procedures should be applied in accordance with the Constitution of Pakistan in
FATA and PATA.
The issues raised and recommendations made in the civil
society report clearly highlight the state of affairs in the country as for as
child rights are concerned. Pakistan’s periodic report being party to the
Convention on the Rights of the Child is also due later this year. Therefore,
its high time for the both the federal and provincial legislature to respond to
the state of child rights in the country and immediately enact all pending
bills related to child rights. Similarly, budgetary allocation should also be
made to ensure that the laws are not limited to law books only and a visible
change is witnessed in the child rights situation in the country.
The writer is a member of the Child Rights Movement and
tweets @amahmood72
Published in The News on Sunday http://jang.com.pk/thenews/Oct2012-weekly/nos-27-10-2012/pol1.htm#6 and http://www.trust.org/alertnet/blogs/asia-views/pakistans-human-rights-scrutiny
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