Pakistan: Change ‘needs enforcing’

Calls from a United Nations body for Pakistan to combat forced conversions and marriages and raise the legal age of marriage are welcome, but “meaningful change will depend on enforcement”.

Experts appointed by the UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) have highlighted that young girls belonging to religious minority groups, including Christians, are often caught in the crosshairs of abusive patterns, and have called for reforms to legislation across the entire nation.

The experts called for the Pakistani state to make forced religious conversion a separate specific offence, crack down on human trafficking and sexual violence, and make 18 the legal age of consent to marry across the entire nation.

The group has expressed “deep concern” for how cases involving victims are dealt with in such circumstances, saying that “any change of religion or belief must be genuinely free from coercion, and marriage must be based on full and free consent, which is not legally possible when the victim is a child.”

The latest international pressure on Pakistan was welcomed by Juliet Chowdhry of the British Asian Christian Association, who said it “highlights a longstanding pattern of vulnerability among religious minority communities, particularly affecting young Christian and Hindu girls,”

However, she told en that how such changes are implemented will be key to achieving lasting change, with nationwide change “difficult to achieve” due to “political sensitivities and differing interpretations of religious law,” with previous such calls having only led to “historically slow progress” which was unevenly applied across provinces.

She said: “If effectively implemented, these reforms could have a significant impact for Christian communities and other minorities by providing a clearer legal framework to challenge forced marriages and better protect those at risk. However, laws alone will not be sufficient; there must also be accountability, as well as practical support for victims.”