ISLAMABAD: Pakistan has categorically rejected the contents of the “2023 Country Report on Human Rights Practices” by the US State Department, terming it “unfair, based on inaccurate information and completely divorced from the ground reality”.
In a statement on Thursday, Pakistan’s Foreign Office said the contents of the report are unfair, based on inaccurate information and are completely divorced from ground reality. It said the US report lacks objectivity and politicized the international human rights agenda, clearly demonstrating double standards.
The Foreign Office expressed concern that the US State Department’s report has highlighted human rights situations across the world but ignored the gross human rights violations in Indian Illegally Occupied Jammu & Kashmir (IIOJK) and the besieged Gaza Strip.
The statement added that the US State Department’s annual exercises of preparing such unsolicited reports remained inherently flawed in their methodology as they use a domestic social lens to judge human rights in a politically biased manner.
The statement said if the US must engage in this exercise, then we expect the US State Department to at least demonstrate objectivity, impartiality and responsibility in conducting assessment of complex issues.
It also emphasized that the State Department report should demonstrate the requisite moral courage to speak the truth about all situations and play a constructive role in bringing an end to atrocities in the most urgent hotpots of gross human rights violations.
The Foreign Office reiterated Pakistan’s commitment to strengthen its own human rights framework, promote the international human rights agenda and uphold fairness and objectivity in the international human rights discourse.
