February 02, 2008	Saturday	Muharram 23, 1429

KARACHI, Feb 1: The Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP) on Friday called for the appointment of an independent election commission, establishment of a neutral caretaker government and resignation of President Pervez Musharraf so that free and fair elections could be held in the country.

Speaking at a press conference, HRCP Secretary-General Iqbal Haider said that the organisation was not asking for a postponement of the Feb 18 polls, it just wanted a neutral setup in place so that no more pre-poll rigging was carried out till the elections were held and that poll-day rigging, which was also crucial, did not take place.

Criticising the recent transfers and postings of government functionaries soon after the announcement of elections, he said that these measures had been taken to influence the outcome of the polls.

The HRCP official also condemned President Musharraf for waging a smear campaign against the deposed chief justice, Iftikhar Chaudhry, during his recent European tour and repeating the same baseless allegations on which he had filed a reference against Justice Chaudhry in the Supreme Judicial Council. He said the Supreme Court had rejected the reference as invalid.

He said that through such tactics President Musharraf had discredited the country and had given the nation a bad name.

Mr Haider also criticised the president’s remarks against a senior journalist, M. Ziauddin, who was performing his professional duties and had asked a question. He said the president had incited the audience to beat up the journalist.

He said that earlier the media persons in the country were being harassed but now the president had become overconfident and was now extending such threats in foreign countries as well.

The HRCP official urged that the pre-November 3 judiciary be restored and harassment and unannounced detention of the deposed chief justice, Iftikhar Chaudhry, his family and his lawyers including Tariq Mehmood and Ali Ahmad Kurd be ended.

He also expressed the hope that Aitzaz Ahsan, who was released on Thursday, would not be detained again.

Mr Haider said that all the above people had been detained for over 90 days, which was against the constitution. He said that the basic human rights guaranteed under Articles 9 and 10 of the constitution also stressed that the detained person be produced in court within 24 hours.

He said that the president by keeping them under detention for more than the prescribed period had not only violated the constitution but had also violated his oath of office in which he had promised to protect and implement the constitution, so he should resign immediately.

The HRCP official expressed his concern over the disposal of the contempt of court proceedings against the former Sindh chief minister, Dr Arbab Ghulam Rahim, and said that the entire proceedings had been carried out by other judges, while the decision had been taken by those judges who had taken oaths under the Provisional Constitution Order (PCO), without hearing the matter themselves.

He also condemned indiscriminate killings in Balochistan, FATA and other parts of the country and said that the HRCP had been issuing statements condemning the barbaric acts of the government and he also slammed the government for not allowing the HRCP teams to visit the affected areas to get an in-depth knowledge and first-hand information of the issue by meeting the area residents.

He said according to his information there was a strong lobby in the security forces that supported the extremists, who behind the scenes were also supported by Gen (retd) Musharraf, who used them to further his nefarious agenda.

HRCP councillors Asad Iqbal Butt and Amarnath and others also spoke.