Multan, Punjab – PAKISTAN, October 26, 2024 | Pakistani authorities have arrested the father of previously abducted and forcibly married 13 year old girl Roshni Shakeel. After the daughter was able to escape, the Multan police in Punjab have retaliated against Roshni’s father by filing a bogus abduction case against him. Reports indicate that he has faced beatings and coercion to reveal his daughter’s whereabouts while being unjustly detained.
Background
On March 13, 2024, Roshani, a Christian girl, was taken from her family. Despite clear evidence of her minority status, local authorities, with the complicity of an Islamic Imam, facilitated her conversion, falsely registering her as 18 and renamed her Zehra Bibi. This fraudulent marriage was accepted as consensual by local officials, inspite of her 13 years, effectively returning Roshni to her abductor, 28-year-old Muazzam Mazher.
Roshni managed to escape in May 2024, after overhearing her abductor discussing plans to sell her. Roshni shared how she was tortured in captivity, and abductors forced her to sign a few documents as well. Although she has reunited with her family, the trauma of her experience lingered. Now she has lost the protection and presence of her only father.
Arresting the Victim
In mid-October 2024, shockingly, rather than prosecuting her abductor, the Multan police have retaliated against Roshani’s father by filing a bogus abduction case against him. His crime? Welcoming his daughter home, who escaped sexual exploitation, a child marriage and forced religious conversion. Reports indicate that the father of the 13-year-old survivor has faced beatings and coercion by authorities to reveal his daughter’s whereabouts while being unjustly detained.
Minority rights activist Joseph Jansen condemned the actions of law enforcement, stating, “Child marriages and the sexual exploitation of underage girls from religious minorities are often validated by the courts, which misuse religious law to keep victims with their abductors instead of reuniting them with their families. This systemic failure must be addressed to protect the rights and dignity of our most vulnerable children.”
Mirjam Bos with Jubilee Campaign NL writes, “This is beyond terrible and breaks my heart.” She had spent a few days with the family only recently when visiting the country.
International Outcry
International experts, including UN representatives, have called upon Pakistani authorities to enact and enforce laws ensuring that marriage occurs only with the free and full consent of both parties. They advocate for raising the minimum age for marriage to 18 and implementing measures to protect children’s rights. This was raised most recently during Pakistan’s ICCPR review. The Human Rights Committee experts shared their alarm regarding the number of girls belonging to religious minorities who had been abducted and forced to convert and marry their abductors. They noted how many of these cases never reached courts and even when they did, several courts still “sent girls back to their abductors.”
Pakistan Promises to Act
In response to these concerns and the question on what steps Pakistan has taken to prevent abduction, forced conversion, and forced marriage of girls, Pakistan boasted of making “excellent progress in harmonising laws on child marriages,” with legislation being amended to raise the age of marriage for both girls and boys to 18 in certain provinces and requested provinces that had not yet raised the age of marriage to 18 to do so. With regards to the forced marriage, Pakistan emphasised that the Penal Code “prohibited all forced marriages and provided a punishment of seven years imprisonment for facilitating forced marriages.” The Government planned to set up a commission that was authorised to assess complaints regarding forced religious conversions. Similar words were made during the last review, words must be turned into concrete action for the rights of the child.
Actions Not Words Will Save the Children
As this case unfolds, it serves as a grim reminder of the urgent need for systemic change in Pakistan’s approach to protecting the rights of religious minorities and safeguarding the welfare of its children.
The Pakistani government must take immediate action to safeguard the rights of vulnerable children and eliminate practices that undermine their dignity and potential, the experts stated. If the laws are in place, as Pakistan says, they need to be implemented without discrimination and in haste.
pictured: Jubilee Campaign’s report on Coerced Conversions from 2022. Please find an updated report from October 2024 here, including Roshni’s case:
Pakistan-USCIRF-report-2024_final