Following the recent arrest of human rights campaigner Gulalai Ismail, AAI's President, Gail Miller, has written to Imran Khan, the newly elected Prime Minister of Pakistan as follows:
Dear Prime Minister, Please accept my congratulations on your election as Prime Minister of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan. We have great hopes that your leadership will produce a change in the direction of your country away from the fundamentalism of the Taliban that it has unfortunately endured in the recent past, in some states.
Having said that, I wish to express my abhorrence at the news of the arrest of human rights campaigner Gulalai Ismail upon her return to the country of her birth. This action by the authorities of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan is in direct contravention of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. That Declaration was drafted in 1948 under the Chairmanship of Eleanor Roosevelt, then first lady of the USA, with Canadian, French, Chinese, and Lebanese colleagues and it remains a seminal document for individual rights and freedom worldwide.
As I’m sure you are aware, the UDHR stemmed from the Four Freedoms: freedom of speech, freedom of religion, freedom from fear and freedom from want that were agreed by The Allies following World War Two. When implemented, the United Nations Charter "reaffirmed faith in fundamental human rights, and dignity and worth of the human person" and committed all member states to promote "universal respect for, and observance of, human rights and fundamental freedoms for all without distinction as to race, sex, language, or religion". Pakistan signed up to this document in 1948.
Since then, the UDHR has been translated into 307 languages/dialects and has served as the foundation for a growing number of national laws, international laws and treaties, as well as for a growing number of regional, sub-national and national institutions protecting and promoting human rights. Unfortunately, Pakistan has been tardy in implementing these humane and worthy measures.
In this particular case, Gulalai Ismail has committed no offence deserving of arrest and detention; she is merely a peaceful human rights campaigner who should be entitled to the freedoms enshrined in the UDHR, including freedom of speech and freedom of movement.
At the time of writing, I hear she has been released from detention but is being denied access to her passport. Consequently, I call upon you to restore her passport to her and to treat her with the sense of fairness that I know you, a former world-class cricketer, must subscribe to.
Yours faithfully,
Gail Miller President of Atheist Alliance International
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