Right to life

The darker side of Pakistan’s lawyers’ cartel has been exposed in the case of law student Khadija Siddiqui, who was stabbed 23 times by her class fellow, Shah Husain, the son of a senior Supreme Court lawyer. After this horrific attack, Khadija could not find a single lawyer to take up her case. Being the […]

This week, Just Asia begins with the resignation of Pakistan’s Prime Minister, Nawaz Sharif. The country’s Supreme Court disqualified Nawaz Sharif on July 28, and called for criminal charges to be filed against Sharif and his family. Under the constitution of Pakistan, the prime minister is elected for five years. Until today however, no elected […]

The Prime Minister of India has just announced a Rs.2000 crore relief package to deal with the damage caused by the devastating floods have impacted the northeast region of India since mid-June, particularly the states of Assam, Manipur, and Arunachal Pradesh. The floods escaped media attention for quite some time, as is want of events […]

The New York Times has published an editorial titled “The Opposition Disappears in Bangladesh” on 28 July 2017. Citing the United Nations human rights experts the New York Times editorial said that “. . . [T]he United Nations called in February for “Bangladesh to act now to halt an increasing number of enforced disappearances in the […]

Dear Friends, The Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) has received information from MASUM, our partner organization in West Bengal. It concerns the enforced disappearance of a civilian at the hands of Border Security Force (BSF) officers at the Indo-Bangladesh border. In the span of a decade, there have been over 1,000 civilian deaths at the […]

By Basil Fernando A lawyer practicing in Negombo was abducted on the night of 12 July 2017 and taken to a deserted field. There six persons, two of whom were wearing camouflaged uniforms, beat him thoroughly on his back and his head, threatening him that, “you should not be messing with us,” and “you should […]

This week Just Asia begins with the case of Bangladeshi lawyer and human rights defender Adilur Rahman Khan, who was detained by Malaysian immigration authorities for more than 12 hours at Kuala Lumpur airport last week. Without giving any reasons for the detention, the authorities finally deported him back to Dhaka. Just Asia speaks to […]

There have been repeated outbreaks of cross-Line of Control firing in Jammu Kashmir, with both sides reporting deaths and injuries including of civilians. Heavy weapons are killing innocent civilians, destroying homes, public and private property. The civilians are forced to flee on both sides of the LOC. Kashmiris of both the sides are leading a […]

Dear Friends, The Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) has received information that the Khalishpur police of the Khulna Metropolitan city has gouged eyes of a detainee for failing to pay bribe. The victim, Mr. Mohammad Shah Jalal (Jibon). The Khalishpur police arrested him from the street near Boalkhali of the Khulna city when he went […]

උප පොලිස් පරීක්ෂක සරත් ප්රේtමචන්ද්රහගේ මරණය කෆ්කානු කතාවකි. එම්. ඉලන්චේලියන් විනිසුරු, ගතවූ දශක කිහිපය තුළ ශ්රීක ලංකාවෙන් බිහිවූ ශ්රේරෂ්ඨතම විනිසුරුවරයෙකි. තවමත් මහාධිකරණ විනිසුරුවරයෙක් වුවද, ඔහු උපරිමාධිකරණ විනිසුරුවරයෙකු වීමට වුව සුදුසු අයෙකි. එය එසේ වූවා නම් ඔහු උපරිමාධිකරණයේ ශ්රේධෂ්ඨ වත්කමක් වනවා පමණක් නොව ශ්රීු ලංකාවේ නීතිය හා සාමය සම්බන්ධයෙන් පවතින සතුට නූපදවන තත්ත්වය රැඩිකල් වෙනසකට භාජනය […]

Justice M. Ilancheliyan is one of the greatest judges to be produced in Sri Lanka for the last many decades. He is still a High Court Judge, but he deserves to be raised to the Supreme Court. If that were to happen, he would be a great asset not only to the Supreme Court, but […]

Dear Friends, The Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) has received information from its local partner in Papua about the torture of Albert Nawipa (15), a junior high school student. Nawipa was illegally taken by the police and brought to a police station near Potikelek market in Wamena. The police accused him of attacking a dancing […]

Dear friends, The Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC), has received information concerning Mrs. A. Rohini Aththanayaka (37), No: 131, Akkara Eighty Village, Sorabora Colony, Mahiyanganaya, Polonnaruwa District. Mrs. Rohini was a registered, expectant mother of the Mahiyanganaya Base Hospital throughout her entire pregnancy. She was in good health and her fetus showed successful growth as […]

Avinash Pandey Gopikrishna Durgaprasad, a 25-year-old gainfully employed young man, committed suicide a few days ago in Pune, Maharashtra. With Maharashtra seeing thousands of suicides every year, and being the state with the most farmer suicides annually, Gopikrishna’s death would not have been significant news on its own. What was different about this case though, was that […]

This week Just Asia begins with India, where the Supreme Court passed a historic judgment last Friday, ordering the Central Bureau of Investigation to probe into the allegations of ‘fake encounters’ by uniformed personnel in the conflict ridden state of Manipur. To ensure an impartial investigation, the Court ordered that no member of the Manipur […]

DIG Lalith A Jayasinghe was arrested and is now being remanded for harbouring an offender and aiding the escape of the chief suspect Swiss Kumar, for the gang rape and the murder of 18 year old Sivaloganathan Vidya on 13 May 2015. The DIG is suspected of having committed an offence punishable under Section 209 […]

Dear Friends, The Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) has received updated information regarding the abduction of a minor from the Bhutto family home. Previously, two brothers from this family were abducted, disappeared and extra-judicially killed. A video of their sister went viral on social and electronic media. She was narrating how persons from military intelligence […]

An article from The Times of India Blogs forwarded by the Asian Human Rights Commission Pehlu Khan, a Muslim, was lynched by Hindu criminals, professing to be cow vigilantes. The incident fills one with grief and anger. Around the same time, Farook, a Muslim atheist in Coimbatore, was lynched by Muslim criminals, claiming to be […]

Law enforcement agencies in Bangladesh have announced on 3 July 2017, that at 11:30 pm they have ‘rescued’ Mr. Farhad Mazhar from a Dhaka bound passenger bus at Noapara in the south-western district Jessore, bordering India. The police later interrogated him during which he was allegedly ill-treated. Farhad was in police custody till 3:00 pm […]

A video has recently surfaced in Pakistan, where a contingent of police officers can be seen baton charging a group of unarmed women mill workers protesting in Muzaffargarh, Punjab. The scuffle occurred inside the district court of Muzaffargarh in broad daylight, yet the judicial officer never took any action against the erring police officers, nor […]