PESHAWAR, June 6: Human rights organizations and activists have termed detention of 24 women and children under the colonial-era Frontier Crimes Regulation, 1901, 'inhuman' and 'barbaric'.
They have requested the chief justices of Pakistan and Peshawar High Court to take suo motu notice of such gross violations of fundamental rights. The 24 detainees, stated to be close relatives of an outlaw, Arsal Khan, were arrested in April as the authorities failed to nab him and his close associates in a two-week long operation in Lakki Marwat and adjoining tribal areas.
The rights groups said that the detention of these 24 women and children, at present lodged at Haripur central prison, was "a challenge to the conscience of all human rights bodies" and that they should join hands for their early release.
They also requested the president and the NWFP governor to take note of this misuse of the FCR and order release of the detainees. The women and children were held under the collective responsibility clause of the FCR and were reportedly convicted by the assistant political agent of the tribal agency concerned.
Their arrest is aimed at pressuring Arsal to surrender before the authorities. "The detention of these women and children are against all norms of humanity and civilized society," commented Mr Arshad Mahmood, deputy national coordinator of SPARC (Society for the Protection of the Rights of the Child).
"How could innocent women and children be held responsible for the wrong doings of their family member?" he questioned. He said that this inhuman act of the administration once again showed that the FCR was a barbaric and black law which should be abolished forthwith and the jurisdiction of superior courts should be extended to Fata.
Mr Mahmood stated that they had been campaigning for the extension of Juvenile Justice System Ordinance, 2000, to the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (Fata) and Provincially Administered Tribal Areas (Pata) so that the rights of child offenders could be safeguarded there.
He said that the detainees were reportedly arrested in the settled district of Lakki Marwat and shifted to tribal area so as to remove them from the jurisdiction of the high court.
He added that the high court could take note of this illegality and take action against the tribal administration. Voice of Prisoners chief Noor Alam Khan said that the action of the tribal administration should be condemned in strongest words.
"Such incidents have been tarnishing the image of the country abroad, but the government has chosen to look the other way," Mr Khan said. He added that even under the FCR, members of a tribe responsible for a crime could be arrested under the collective responsibility clause, but family members of an offender, including small children and women, could not be detained.
In a recent press briefing, secretary of Fata (security), Brigadier (retd) Mahmood Shah, claimed that the women and children were kept in preventive detention. He said that the Arsal group had kidnapped 14 persons, including two women.
