Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs, what recent assessment he has made of the potential implications for his policies of the human rights situation in Islamabad, in the context of reports of deaths and mass detentions of protesters from Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf on 26 and 27 November 2024.

The UK strongly supports individuals' rights to expression without censorship, intimidation or unnecessary restriction. We will continue to urge the Government of Pakistan to respect these fundamental freedoms, underlining that any human rights violations should be fully investigated in line with international human rights law. I raised the importance of upholding civil and political rights with senior Ministers, including the Minister for Human Rights and Interior Minister, on my visit to Pakistan last month. The British High Commission also regularly raises these issues with the Pakistani authorities at a senior level.