Statement

Mr. Nisar Baloch, aged 46, was shot dead on November 7, by motorbike riders. Police have refused to mention the names of the murderers in the First Investigation Report (FIR), owing to the fact that the accused persons belong to ruling political party, MQM, which has a background of target killings. On November 6, the […]

The Pakistan army has imposed censorship by various means on the independent news coming out of the areas where the army is conducting operations against militants. Officers of the Inter Services Public Relations (ISPR), are reported to have been calling media officials to their offices and telling them to stop covering the news independently and […]

Much of the human rights advocacy concerning the use of torture in Burma is centred on cases of political detainees. These cases rightly deserve close attention and study. However, the Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) is aware that most victims of torture in Burma are not political prisoners but, as in other parts of Asia, […]

The Asian Human Rights Commission has learned that on 22 October 2009 Mr. F. M. Masum, a journalist of an English language national daily newspaper in Bangladesh, was tortured by members of the Rapid Action Battalion (RAB), at his residence in Dhaka. The New Age newspaper reports that at around noon on Thursday a team […]

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE AHRC-STM-216-2009 17 October, 2009 A Statement by the Asian Human Rights Commission INDIA: World Food Day and International Day for the Eradication of Poverty: Do not give food, give the ‘right to food’ India is a country moving too slowly to ensure food and health security to malnourished children. The Global Hunger […]

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE AHRC-STM-216-2009 17 October, 2009 A Statement by the Asian Human Rights Commission INDIA: World Food Day and International Day for the Eradication of Poverty: Do not give food, give the ‘right to food’ India is a country moving too slowly to ensure food and health security to malnourished children. The Global Hunger […]

The state has been illegally interrupted in Sarghoda district, with the victim informed that he is now not allowed to leave his house, and liable to be arrested if he does so. The order, he reports, came verbally from one of the officers who tortured him. His police security guards have told him that they […]

Last week the Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) issued an urgent appeal on the case of a man in Burma who has been imprisoned as a consequence of making repeated complaints about electricity supply and other poor services in his neighbourhood of Rangoon. The complainant, U Khin Maung Kyi, 45, in August had called the […]

No progress has been made in the investigation into the extrajudicial , Ghulam Mohammad Baloch, Sher Mohammad Baloch and Lala Muneer Jan Baloch, after their abduction by the persons from the military, frontier corps (FC) and intelligence agencies, on April 3, 2009 from their lawyer’s office. It is reported that the army and FC, who […]

The Pakistani parliament is debating a controversial American bill, the Kerry Luger bill, which would provide Pakistan with US$ 1.5 billion per year over the next five years for democratic, economic and social development programmes. There are several conditions in the bill about military aid to check the involvement of state intelligence agencies in Islamic […]

   Mr. Ranga Bandara, a Member of Parliament gave a live interview to the Asian Human Rights Commission, based in Hong Kong, on October 6th about the arson attack and about the political environment in which this attach took place. Following is a summary of the recorded interview: A group of people entered my premises […]

The opposition politician Ranga Bandara’s house was burned to cinders on the evening of the 4th October. Sometime earlier, the house of another opposition politician, John Pulle, was similarly razed to the ground. In any place where the rule of law exists, even to a basic level, this kind of action would be deemed incredible. […]

Last Friday, the Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) issued an Urgent Appeal on the case of three teenage girls who have been imprisoned for alleged involvement in an illegal lottery ring in Burma (AHRC-UAC-131-2009). Although the three are all under 16, they were tried in an adult court and sentenced to prison because the police […]

On October 5 1998, the government of Bangladesh, under the leadership of Sheikh Hasina, ratified the UN Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (CAT). Ratification to any international treaty by a nation-state automatically imposes an international obligation to make domestic legislation that is in conformity with the treaty that […]

Human rights organisations working against caste based discrimination in the region must engage in debates on the need for a comprehensive UN framework to tackle caste based discrimination and should encourage affected governments to support such initiative at the UN level. This is the response from the Asian Human Rights Commission and The International Dalit […]

A newspaper advertisement published by the Government of India on Sunday, September 20, 2009, reads ‘Naxalites are nothing but coldblooded criminals’. This advertisement is part of the government’s intensified campaign to combat Naxalite activities in the country. It comes a few weeks after the Prime Minister’s declaration–later confirmed by the Union Home Minister–that Naxalite activities […]

The violent humiliation of three women reported from Punjab this week has thrown stark light on the complicity of the police and the courts in gender-based crimes — and on the continued degeneration of law enforcement in the region. This week three woman accused of prostitution were forced to parade naked through their neighborhood and onto […]

The Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) express its sincere condolences to the Filipino people for the terrible loss of life caused by typhoon Ondoy (international name: Ketsana) that affected Metro Manila and nearby provinces on Saturday (September 26). The displacement of people and families, the destruction of their livelihoods, properties and homes has brought untold […]

To argue that some Filipino policemen are corrupt and extorting money on pretext of enforcing their duties and obligations is something that no rational person could disagree with. This is an established fact and even policemen themselves know of how their colleagues make money and obtain perks while on duty. This however, is perpetual and […]

Alexander Solzhenitsyn added the word ‘gulag’ to the human rights vocabulary to describe a type of experience that is being repeated in many parts of the world. His own three volume study was the experience of Russia from 1918 to 1956. Today, in Sri Lanka this same horror is being experienced by the entire population. […]