The Civil Society Organizations comprising human rights activists, professional groups and political parties organized a demonstration outside the Karachi Press Club on May 18, 2014 against the murder of Rashid Rehman, a lawyer and a human rights activist. He was murdered on May 7, 2014 in Multan for defending a lecturer accused of blasphemy. The speakers at the rally said that intolerance and extremism were peaking and the voice of justice and dissent was being clamped. Rehman murderers are yet to be caught who had given death threat to him in the presence of the judge.

The Civil Society Organizations comprising human rights activists, professional groups and political parties organized a demonstration outside the Karachi Press Club on May 18, 2014 against the murder of Rashid Rehman, a lawyer and a human rights activist. He was murdered on May 7, 2014 in Multan for defending a lecturer accused of blasphemy. The speakers at the rally said that intolerance and extremism were peaking and the voice of justice and dissent was being clamped. Rehman murderers are yet to be caught who had given death threat to him in the presence of the judge.

Pakistan Blasphemy Laws are once again under the national and international spotlight following the gruesome murder of Advocate Rashid Rehman, a lawyer and a human rights activist who was shot dead on May 7, 2014 in his office for defending a teacher of Bahauddin Zakaria University, in Multan, central Pakistan. The teacher was accused of having committed blasphemy. Following on the the heel of this murderous act, as many as 68 lawyers also faced the same charge under Section 295A of the constitution of Pakistan by the Kotwali Police in Jhang, another town in central Pakistan which is the hotbed of the country simmering sectarian wars. The infamous radical sunni Lashkar-i- Jhangvi and its precursor Sipahe Sahaba Pakistan also originated in Jhang. It is no surprise therefore that the Jhang police wasted no time in instituting the case against the lawyers who were protesting Rehman murder. The case followed a death threat made by religious groups, who warned lawyers of dire consequences if they stood for blasphemy offenders. Ignoring the threat, a group of lawyers did organize a protest against the wilful murder of Rashid Rehman who was only performing his duty as a defender of law and justice. In retaliation to the widespread condemnation by the lawyers and the civil society organization, on the murder of Mr Rehman, the perpetrators planned another deadly act of attacking the Central Jail Multan and killing all the accused in blasphemy case including lecturer Junaid Hafeez, who was accused of defaming the Holy Prophet on social media. [1] Preempting the attack, Multan police on a tip-off, arrested five alleged terrorists on May 11. Just a week before the murder of Mr Rehman, a mosque in the Capital Islamabad was named after Mumtaz Qadri, the guard who had murdered former Governor of Punjab Mr Salman Taseer [2] in Islamabad on January 4, 2011. Qadri gunned down Taseer because the former governor advocated changes to the Blasphemy Law and had also met with Asiya Bibi...

Pakistan Blasphemy Laws are once again under the national and international spotlight following the gruesome murder of Advocate Rashid Rehman, a lawyer and a human rights activist who was shot dead on May 7, 2014 in his office for defending a teacher of Bahauddin Zakaria University, in Multan, central Pakistan. The teacher was accused of having committed blasphemy. Following on the the heel of this murderous act, as many as 68 lawyers also faced the same charge under Section 295A of the constitution of Pakistan by the Kotwali Police in Jhang, another town in central Pakistan which is the hotbed of the country simmering sectarian wars. The infamous radical sunni Lashkar-i- Jhangvi and its precursor Sipahe Sahaba Pakistan also originated in Jhang. It is no surprise therefore that the Jhang police wasted no time in instituting the case against the lawyers who were protesting Rehman murder. The case followed a death threat made by religious groups, who warned lawyers of dire consequences if they stood for blasphemy offenders. Ignoring the threat, a group of lawyers did organize a protest against the wilful murder of Rashid Rehman who was only performing his duty as a defender of law and justice. In retaliation to the widespread condemnation by the lawyers and the civil society organization, on the murder of Mr Rehman, the perpetrators planned another deadly act of attacking the Central Jail Multan and killing all the accused in blasphemy case including lecturer Junaid Hafeez, who was accused of defaming the Holy Prophet on social media. [1] Preempting the attack, Multan police on a tip-off, arrested five alleged terrorists on May 11. Just a week before the murder of Mr Rehman, a mosque in the Capital Islamabad was named after Mumtaz Qadri, the guard who had murdered former Governor of Punjab Mr Salman Taseer [2] in Islamabad on January 4, 2011. Qadri gunned down Taseer because the former governor advocated changes to the Blasphemy Law and had also met with Asiya Bibi...

An international conference at Oxford University on May 10 looked at the possible opportunities that may arise out of the multiple crises that Pakistan currently faces. During proceedings and presentations, the 27 speakers ¶ including those from Pakistan, the US, Germany, Canada and the UK ¶ dilated on the security, economy, sociology and foreign relations of Pakistan. Much of the talk centred around the crisis of governance, insecurity, energy issues, ethnic and nationalistic conflicts and Pakistan policy discord with India, the US and its skewed policy towards Afghanistan. Ironically, even relatively optimistic speakers predicated their projections on several ¿ifs– and ¿buts–. Convened by the Quaid-e-Azam fellow at St Anthony College, Oxford University, Dr Ishtiaq Ahmed, the conference drew prominent intellectuals from all places mentioned above, aiming to generate interest to re-engage Pakistan challenges at the intellectual, academic and policy level. Pakistandisparate education system and the sociopolitical distortionsit has brought about also featured prominently in the discussions, with Mosharraf Zaidi and Professor Saeed Shafqat underlining that the near abdication of quality and values– education by the state had stymied public sector educational institutions– progress. The mantra of private schools being the panacea for the education sector ills must be dispensed with, Zaidi said, underlining the need to regularise all private schools and introducing a unified and harmonious curriculum, at least on religion, history and language. One of the formidable challenges for Pakistan, as speakers pointed out, is thechange of guardsin the capitals of Pakistan eastern and western neighbours. They cautioned that with the possible elevation of Narendra Modi as the Indian premier and with a new president in Afghanistan, the Pakistani civilian and military leadership needed to review its existing prism on both countries and come up with a pre-emptive, bold and...

An international conference at Oxford University on May 10 looked at the possible opportunities that may arise out of the multiple crises that Pakistan currently faces. During proceedings and presentations, the 27 speakers ¶ including those from Pakistan, the US, Germany, Canada and the UK ¶ dilated on the security, economy, sociology and foreign relations of Pakistan. Much of the talk centred around the crisis of governance, insecurity, energy issues, ethnic and nationalistic conflicts and Pakistan policy discord with India, the US and its skewed policy towards Afghanistan. Ironically, even relatively optimistic speakers predicated their projections on several ¿ifs– and ¿buts–. Convened by the Quaid-e-Azam fellow at St Anthony College, Oxford University, Dr Ishtiaq Ahmed, the conference drew prominent intellectuals from all places mentioned above, aiming to generate interest to re-engage Pakistan challenges at the intellectual, academic and policy level. Pakistandisparate education system and the sociopolitical distortionsit has brought about also featured prominently in the discussions, with Mosharraf Zaidi and Professor Saeed Shafqat underlining that the near abdication of quality and values– education by the state had stymied public sector educational institutions– progress. The mantra of private schools being the panacea for the education sector ills must be dispensed with, Zaidi said, underlining the need to regularise all private schools and introducing a unified and harmonious curriculum, at least on religion, history and language. One of the formidable challenges for Pakistan, as speakers pointed out, is thechange of guardsin the capitals of Pakistan eastern and western neighbours. They cautioned that with the possible elevation of Narendra Modi as the Indian premier and with a new president in Afghanistan, the Pakistani civilian and military leadership needed to review its existing prism on both countries and come up with a pre-emptive, bold and...

An international conference at Oxford University on May 10 looked at the possible opportunities that may arise out of the multiple crises that Pakistan currently faces. During proceedings and presentations, the 27 speakers ¶ including those from Pakistan, the US, Germany, Canada and the UK ¶ dilated on the security, economy, sociology and foreign relations of Pakistan. Much of the talk centred around the crisis of governance, insecurity, energy issues, ethnic and nationalistic conflicts and Pakistan policy discord with India, the US and its skewed policy towards Afghanistan. Ironically, even relatively optimistic speakers predicated their projections on several ¿ifs– and ¿buts–. Convened by the Quaid-e-Azam fellow at St Anthony College, Oxford University, Dr Ishtiaq Ahmed, the conference drew prominent intellectuals from all places mentioned above, aiming to generate interest to re-engage Pakistan challenges at the intellectual, academic and policy level. Pakistandisparate education system and the sociopolitical distortionsit has brought about also featured prominently in the discussions, with Mosharraf Zaidi and Professor Saeed Shafqat underlining that the near abdication of quality and values– education by the state had stymied public sector educational institutions– progress. The mantra of private schools being the panacea for the education sector ills must be dispensed with, Zaidi said, underlining the need to regularise all private schools and introducing a unified and harmonious curriculum, at least on religion, history and language. One of the formidable challenges for Pakistan, as speakers pointed out, is thechange of guardsin the capitals of Pakistan eastern and western neighbours. They cautioned that with the possible elevation of Narendra Modi as the Indian premier and with a new president in Afghanistan, the Pakistani civilian and military leadership needed to review its existing prism on both countries and come up with a pre-emptive, bold and...