Human rights watch

https://www.hrw.org/news/2022/08/23/pakistan-make-torture-crime

New York) – Pakistan’s Senate should urgently pass a bill that would make torture a criminal offense,
Human Rights Watch said today. On August 1, 2022, the National Assembly passed the Torture and
Custodial Death (Prevention and Punishment) Act, which, if enacted into law, will for the first time
criminalize torture by Pakistan’s security forces. The bill has been sent to the standing committee and
can be considered as early as in the next Senate session later in August.

While Pakistan’s Constitution prohibits the use of torture “for extracting evidence,” no domestic
legislation makes committing torture a criminal offense. Pakistan is a party to core international human
rights treaties that prohibit the use of torture and other ill-treatment and mandate parties to the treaty
to criminalize the practice.

“The first step to ending Pakistan’s endemic torture problem is to criminalize it,” said John Sifton, Asia
advocacy director at Human Rights Watch. “Justice and accountability in cases of torture will only be
possible if parliament passes the torture bill and the government enforces the law by carrying out
transparent and impartial investigations into torture allegations.”

Human Rights Watch has long documented the widespread use of torture and other ill-treatment by the
Pakistani police during criminal investigations. Criminal suspects from marginalized groups are at
particular risk of police abuse. Methods of torture include beatings with batons and littars (leather
straps), stretching and crushing legs with roola (metal rods), sexual violence, prolonged sleep
deprivation, and causing severe mental anguish, including by forcing detainees to watch other people
being tortured.

In a widely publicized case in September 2019, Salahuddin Ayubi died in police custody after being
arrested for theft. A forensic report confirmed that Ayubi, whose family said he had a mental health
condition, had been severely beaten.

Police typically use torture to obtain confessions and other information from suspects, or to extract
bribes from those in custody. Officials have claimed that the police resort to physical force because they
are not trained in sophisticated methods of investigation and forensic analysis, but often police use
torture to punish detainees and obtain quick confessions. In August 2019, the Punjab anti-corruption
department discovered a cell run by police officers in Lahore where suspects were kept in secret
detention and tortured.

Allegations of torture in political cases need to be investigated by authorities independently of the

political interests of the governing authorities, Human Rights Watch said. During previous governments,
there have been numerous credible allegations of torture and ill-treatment of political opponents or
critics of the government.

The use of torture in political cases has received recent attention. Shahbaz Gill, a senior official with the
opposition party Pakistan Tehrik-i-Insaaf (PTI), was arrested in Islamabad on August 9 on charges of
sedition and incitement to mutiny after he said on a television program that junior military officers
should not follow orders that are against public opinion. Pakistan’s sedition law, based on a colonial-era
British provision, is vague and overbroad and has often been used against political opponents.

Gill’s lawyers and political party colleagues allege that Pakistani security officials beat and otherwise
tortured Gill in custody. They also assert that he was denied medical treatment for his asthma condition.
Pakistan government officials have denied the allegations. An immediate, independent, and transparent
investigation into the allegations should be conducted, Human Rights Watch said.

Pakistan ratified the United Nations Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman and
Degrading Treatment or Punishment in 2010. Under articles 2 and 4, Pakistan is obligated to bring
domestic law in line with the treaty. The UN Committee against Torture and the Human Rights
Committee, in each of their Concluding Observations following Pakistan’s 2017 treaty reviews, urged
Pakistan to make torture a criminal offense under Pakistani law.

Pakistan also pledged to criminalize torture as part of its candidacy in June 2020 for the UN Human
Rights Council. In February 2020, the European Commission’s GSP+ assessment report for 2018-19, for
the program that provides trade preference to eligible countries, said, “Pakistan’s legislation falls short
of a law specifically defining torture and fails to explicitly criminalize torture as required under the
Convention Against Torture.”
“By passing the torture bill, Pakistan will start a long-overdue process of reform to ensure that future
allegations of torture are transparently investigated and that those responsible held accountable,”
Sifton said.