Heinous crime: ‘Peshawar school attack a crime against humanity’

LAHORE:

Representatives of non-governmental organisations, media and members of the civil society on Friday denounced the Peshawar attack ‘as a crime against humanity’ during a meeting at the office of the South Asian Free Media Association (SAFMA).

Those present on the occasion called for the revision of invidious policies and regressive ideologies that had polarised society by compelling one section of the youth to take up arms and the other to become victims. They welcomed the unanimous resolve of all political parties at the conference convened by Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif to make no distinction between terrorists and rid the nation of the scourge. The participants welcomed the vow of Army Chief Raheel Sharif to not let any terrorist go scot-free. They passed a resolution along with a number of recommendations during the meeting reiterating their commitment to eradicate terrorism. These included: terrorism, religious extremism, and sectarianism constitute the principle threat to the existence of the nation and civilised people; terrorism is rooted in the misinterpretation of history, religious teachings, flawed policies, erroneous security paradigms and the use of religion for furthering political ends and an exclusivist curriculum; some state institutions, governments, political parties, academics and media personnel have patronised divisive polices of talibanisation, militarisation, terrorism and sectarianism in the name of religious articles. They said this had fostered the rise of parallel power structures, bloodthirsty militias, sectarianism and national polarisation.



Those present demanded that all divisive ideologies, militias, and hate material be proscribed; an inclusive narrative be promoted to enable basic freedoms to flourish, a thorough counterterrorism strategy be adopted and implemented, all extremist militias be proscribed, rational and peaceful security and foreign policies be adopted, counterterrorism personnel be subjected to public scrutiny at appropriate forums and martyred military and civilian personnel be honoured with public gratitutde.

Human Rights Commission of Pakistan Director IA Rehman, writer Ahmed Rashid, journalist Hussain Naqi, educationist Abbas Rashid and editor Khalid Farooqi addressed the gathering among others.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 20^th, 2014.