“Are these the people with bullets who took my papa away?” two-year-old Sabiha Ahmad asked her mother anxiously when AFP visited her family, members of Pakistan’s persecuted Ahmadi minority, who are currently living in hiding. The toddler’s family have had little contact with anyone since they were forced to flee for their lives on November 20 when hundreds of people torched a factory in the eastern city of Jhelum after rumours spread workers were burning copies of the Koran. Sabiha’s …
An American University Professor has exposed a Pakistani University’s secret hiring policy that prohibits hiring of Ahmadiyya Muslims. The professor is a member of an external committee that reviews applications of faculty candidates at Pakistani Universities.
November, 27, 2015 — It was pitch dark at 2:30am in the morning. The only sounds that Imran* could hear were coming from the factory that was set ablaze a kilometer away, and the slogans against Imran and the rest of the Ahmadi community in Jehlum. I was almost whispering, convincing my fellow Ahmadis to come out of hiding and show themselves to me, so that I could take them to a safe distance but there was no response, Imran …
A group of masked men set fire to Christian Television Channel Gawahi TV in Pakistani port city of Karachi overnight. The attackers fled as the building collapsed due to the fire. According to employees, the arson attack occurred at 2.30am (local time). The fire destroyed entire complex including studios, computers, Bibles and cable network equipment.
A mob torched the homes of several Ahmadiyya families and an Ahmadiyya Mosque in Pakistan’s Jhelum district on Saturday. The incident came just a day after a mob burnt down a factory owned by Ahmadiyya Muslims in the same area. The Mosque which is located in Kala Gujran area of Jhelum was being guarded by local police when the mob broke through the security cordon, which was established to safeguard the Mosque, following Friday night’s unrest.
An angry mob set ablaze a factory owned by members of the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community in Jhelum on Friday. Around 2,000 people surrounded Pakistan Chipboard Factory on GT Road in Jhelum city on Friday night after announcements were made on loudspeakers in nearby mosques that a factory employee had allegedly desecrated the Quran. Following the announcements people from not immediate vicinity but even from nearby villages gathered as a mob and set ablaze the chipboard factory. The owner’s residence, adjoining …
Pakistani actor Hamza Ali Abbasi, who has not shied away from discussing controversial issues on social media, has this time spoken out in favor of religious freedom and criticized the country’s growing intolerance towards Ahmadiyya and Shia Muslims.
Sitara was a special kid from the start. Questioning everything around her, she was a difficult student to be satisfied. At the young age of 9, she passed her O Levels exams to become the youngest child in the world to achieve the feat. In an ideal world, she would have been praised and supported by the government of Pakistan and civil society alike. But Sitara Brooj Akbar belongs to the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community. She wouldn’t go out of her …
A documentary featuring testimonials and stories of minorities was screened at the Jinnah Institute (JI) on Friday. Titled ‘Strangers in their own land’ and ‘اپنی زمین پر اجنبی’ for English and Urdu segments respectively, the documentary is an initiative of the institute. It was screened at a closed-door event and was attended by its filmmaker Ali Aftab Saeed, human rights activists, and researchers, who opened the floor for discussion and encouraged feedback post-screening.
Ahmadiyya Muslims targeted in fresh gun attacks in Karachi, Pakistan. On 11th October Unknown men shot three Ahmadis in “Gulshan e Iqbal” area of the large Pakistani seaport city of Karachi.
The state is not a silent spectator, but an active participant in the persecution of Ahmadis, accused members of the Ahmadi community at a meeting organised by the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP). The meeting was titled, ‘Ahmadi Citizens: dealing with discrimination, exclusion’ and was held at the Regent Plaza on Sunday. “The persecution, these days, has taken a new trend as door-to-door conversions of people belonging to the faith are taking place where a cleric accompanies the area’s …
A petition seeking directives for Chiniot police to prevent the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community from offering ritual sacrifice on Eid ul Adha was disposed of by Lahore High Court with a directive for the DPO to proceed in the matter in accordance with law. On receiving the order a few days before Eid, the DPO sought guidance from the inspector general of Punjab police. The DPO has yet to receive a response from the office of the IGP.