CAP Liberté de Conscience October 2024
The International Human Rights Committee (IHRC) has condemned the Pakistani government’s relentless campaign of persecution against the Ahmadiyya Muslim community. In a scathing incident report, the IHRC has documented a series of horrific attacks on Ahmadi mosques and places of worship carried out with the direct involvement and support of Pakistani authorities.
According to the IHRC, over the past few days, four Ahmadi mosques have been desecrated, with their domes and minarets demolished by police and other law enforcement agencies. The report details several specific incidents:
- On October 1-2, the Assistant Commissioner of Sangla Hill, accompanied by a large police force, led a midnight operation to dismantle parts of a historic Ahmadi mosque in the village of Murd Chak 45, District Sheikhupura.
- On the night of October 4, a large number of plainclothes police officers arrived at an Ahmadi mosque in Jahanian, Khanewal, Punjab, and demolished the minarets while applying cement over the Islamic creed. The local leader of the extremist Tehrik Labbaik Pakistan group later thanked the officials for this action.
- On October 10-11, police destroyed the minarets of an Ahmadi mosque in Mohlankay, Punjab Gujranwala, forcibly entering the premises in the middle of the night and taking a community member into custody.
- Also on October 10-11, around 10-15 police officers led by the Security In-charge of Ghakkar Mandi illegally entered an Ahmadi mosque in Gujranwala, damaged security cameras, confiscated phones, and then desecrated the minarets under the cover of darkness.
The IHRC has been consistently raising its voice against the attacks on Ahmadi places of worship and graves in Pakistan. In July 2024, a group of top UN human rights experts had urged an “immediate end to discrimination and violence against Ahmadis in Pakistan,” citing documented evidence of extrajudicial killings, arbitrary arrests, and curtailment of religious freedoms. However, their pleas appear to have fallen on deaf ears.
The IHRC is now once again strongly urging the international community to impress upon the Pakistani government the need to honor its responsibility to protect the religious freedoms of the Ahmadis and bring the perpetrators of these vicious attacks to justice. The organization has called for the government to align its laws and practices with international human rights standards, as enshrined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.
The systematic targeting and persecution of the peaceful Ahmadiyya community in Pakistan is a grave violation of fundamental human rights. The international community must take immediate and decisive action to hold the Pakistani government accountable and put an end to this abhorrent campaign of religious intolerance and violence.
