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Abbasi says multi-dimensional legal reforms, institutional mechanisms to ensure rights protection, human values
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Islamabad points out denial, violations of very basic of human rights to Palestinians, Kashmiris, Rohingyas
ISLAMABAD: Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi has reiterated that Pakistan is fully alive to its national and international responsibilities to preserve the human rights.
In a message on the International Human Rights Day being observed across the globe on Sunday, he said that Pakistan stood resolute in upholding the core values and fundamental rights pertaining to the equality of all human beings, peaceful coexistence, respect for diversity and difference, and protection against discrimination in any form, as ordained by the religion and obligated by the constitution.
The prime minister said it was Islam that for the first time, incorporated human rights as an integral part of its code of law, thereby providing the necessary legal foundations for just and inclusive society. “The International Human Rights Day is an occasion to reaffirm commitment to the protection of human rights and the promotion of human values in the true spirit of the universal declaration by the UN in 1948,” he said.
In conformity with their beliefs and commitments, he said that the government of Pakistan was undertaking several important initiatives, including multi-dimensional legal reforms and the establishment of institutional mechanisms that would ensure the protection of human rights, especially in the case of marginalised and disadvantages societal groups.
He said that an autonomous National Commission for Human Rights had been established and the action plan for human rights prioritised the rights of women, children, minorities and persons with disabilities. He said that he would also like to avail the opportunity to appreciate efforts made by the office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights for the protection of rights around the world.
“However, we must also understand that the apathetic denial and grim violations of even the very basic of human rights to the Palestinians, the Kashmiris and Rohingyas continue to call in question the collective conscience of the international community,” Prime Minister Abbasi said.
Nevertheless, he said that he had firm faith that with the earnestness of purpose and concerted effort by the international fraternity, they would, one day, build a fair and equitable world in which all communities, peoples, and nations would have the same fundamental rights – grounded in their being human, and not their difference.
