A joint Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP) – AGHS fact-finding team has reported receiving credible testimonies indicating large-scale sexual abuse of children over many years in Husain Khanwala village in Kasur district. The HRCP issued the report of the fact-finding team on Wednesday. The team visited the village and the relevant police station on August 11. “The fact-finding team agrees that the crime remained concealed largely because the victims’ families paid extortion money. They were also intimidated. The police could not have been unaware of the video clippings freely circulating in the area and rumours of abuse of children. Their failure to take action lends support to charges of policemen’s collusion with the culprits,” it states. The joint investigation team formed by the Punjab chief minister needs to dig deep and conduct a detailed, transparent investigation. If an independent human rights body was able to uncover such details, there should be nothing stopping the state — with all the resources at its disposal — to get to the bottom of the matter. However, care must be taken so that the victims’ identities are not made public and their privacy is protected. Additionally, the state must provide the victims with qualified medical and psychological help. Tragedies occur and, after the initial shock, are soon forgotten. But we must not let the Kasur outrage recede into the background. Justice demands that the criminals who violated these children are brought to book while the administrative and law-enforcement machinery across this nation needs to be shaken up to crack down on the abuse and sexual assault of minors — which is by no means a limited phenomenon in Pakistan.
pk.shafaqna.com
