Persecution of Religious Minorities: Pakistan

Andrew Turner Excerpts

Thursday 11th February 2016 Westminster Hall

[Chris White (Warwick and Leamington) (Con)]

I congratulate the hon. Lady on securing this important debate. I take this opportunity to praise Mohammed Salim and other members of the Ahmadiyya Muslim Association who do so much for our community in Warwick and Leamington.

Does the hon. Lady agree that if Pakistan expects to grow its economy exponentially, it needs to address these serious humanitarian concerns and, in particular, the Pakistani Government’s failure to legally recognise the Ahmadiyya Muslim community?

[Mr Andrew Turner (in the Chair)]

That intervention went on a bit long. Let’s get them a bit shorter.

[Siobhain McDonagh]

I completely agree with the hon. Member for Warwick and Leamington (Chris White). It is a thriving, well-educated community that has much to give Pakistan, and it will do so if given the freedom and opportunity.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Gareth Thomas]

In a spirit of north and south London solidarity, does the hon. Gentleman agree that another thing that the Foreign Office could do is to raise with Bulgaria the discrimination that takes place against Ahmadis there? Bulgaria is a key European Union ally and one with which we ought to have good contacts, so we could discuss the issue repeatedly until progress happens and the discrimination ends.

[Mr Andrew Turner (in the Chair)]

We are getting rather long interventions, which we should not be.

[Paul Scully]

Bulgaria is an important issue, which has also been raised with me and, I am sure, with the hon. Member for Mitcham and Morden when we have visited the mosque in Morden. I am grateful to the hon. Member for Harrow West (Mr Thomas) for drawing it to our attention, because it is important to put on record our concern about persecution around the world, especially when it is somewhere quite so close to home.

In addition to visiting the mosque and meeting members of the Ahmadiyya community, I am looking forward to the Jalsa Salana in Alton, which is coming up, as is the peace symposium organised by the UK community. I can join them and say, “Salaam alaikum”, to show respect and knowing that people will be able to respond in kind, freely, because what the UK does particularly well is religious tolerance. We always need to work at it and to ensure that we tackle intolerance wherever it arises in this country, but, on the whole, if we compare ourselves to many other countries, we lead the way. That is to be welcomed.

In Pakistan, as we have heard from hon. Members, the blasphemy laws are poorly designed, being very general and wide. That leads to a broad interpretation, which is used to persecute and oppress the Ahmadiyya community. How can it be that in the 21st century we hear examples of people who want to wipe out the Ahmadiyya community in Pakistan?

We have heard about how members of the Ahmadiyya community in Pakistan are unable to vote. They have to declare themselves as non-Muslims and the founder of their religion, Mirza Ghulam Ahmad, as an apostate and a liar. How can we stand by and let that happen? We have heard numerous terrible examples of violence and arrests as recently as November 2015, when a factory and several homes were burnt down, and January this year, when a man was killed in Rabwah. That is the centre of the Ahmadiyya community in Pakistan, so there is no hiding place when there is such wide acceptance of oppression and persecution.

As we have heard, Pakistan is a signatory to the international covenant on civil and political rights, which it ratified in 2010. Two weeks ago, with a number of colleagues, I spent a week in Strasbourg at the Council of Europe, where we talked about human rights closer to home. If discussions about agreements are ever to mean something and it is not to be just a talking shop, it is important that we take a lead and ensure that people who ratify documents adhere to them in everything they do.

We cannot stand by in the 21st century and allow a situation where a simplistic, oppressive set of laws, and the interpretation of those laws, is allowed to affect a community in such a way. I ask the Minister and the Government what the UK can do, alongside the signatories of the ICCPR, to push further on that. What can we do with UK aid to further transparency, and what can we do to use aid for education as leverage to ensure that religion is taught as widely as possible and that we do not have the current situation of textbooks skewed against the Ahmadiyya community, which was mentioned earlier? What can we do to urge Pakistan to restore the right to vote and to repeal blasphemy laws? Finally, can we urge Pakistan to prosecute incitement and hate speech against Ahmadis and religious minorities?

This evening I am travelling to Burma, where I will meet a couple of Rohingya activists. As with any aspect of religion, the Muslim world is complex. When different denominations, sects and groups disagree on fundamental matters such as who was the last prophet and who is the true leader of their faith, it will always be complicated, but that is not to say that we cannot demand and push for greater tolerance so that we can live alongside each other, wherever we are in the world.