Supporters of Islamist group Tehreek-e-Labbaik Pakistan hold a protest in Islamabad on Nov. 2 against the acquittal of Asia Bibi. Pakistan’s government has been criticized for agreeing to the group’s demands.
Pakistan’s independent hu-man rights body has condemned the government’s inability to preserve “the writ of the state” during protests that erupted after the acquittal of Catholic woman Asia Bibi in a blasphemy case.
The Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP) condemned the government’s submissive response to protests by Islamist group Tehreek-e-Labbaik Pakistan (TLP), terming the rapid agreement to the group’s demands as “a mockery of the rule of law.”
“What was hailed as a land-mark judgment and a human rights victory unraveled into a situation in which there was no distinction between the peaceful right to dissent and the thuggery of mobs who claimed a moral right to wreak public havoc, to attack citizens and law enforce-ment personnel, to wantonly destroy property and to incite hatred against religious minorities,” said HRCP in a statement on Nov. 4.
