Pakistan government has withdrawn the police security provided to leading human rights activist Ansar Burney, who said the move appeared to be linked to his recent visit to India.
ISLAMABAD: Pakistan government has withdrawn the police security provided to leading human rights activist Ansar Burney, who said the move appeared to be linked to his recent visit to India and exposed him to "extreme danger".
Burney, who has received many threats for his work including his campaign to save Indian death row prisoner Sarabjit Singh, has had police security for the past 15 years.
Five guards posted at Burney's home in the port city of Karachi and two armed bodyguards assigned to him were withdrawn on October 25, on the eve of his visit to India to accept the 'Mother Teresa Memorial International Award' for his work for human rights and social justice.
Burney said no reason had been given so far by authorities for the move. "All the security provided to me has been removed due to my pro-human rights policies, struggle for the release of innocent Indian and Pakistani prisoners and my recent trip to India," he said.
"It looks like I am being made to pay a big price for taking up the cause of Indian and other innocent prisoners in Pakistan," he said, adding that he believed the move was also linked to his campaign to get Sarabjit's death sentence converted to life imprisonment.
Burney, the former Human Rights Minister, claimed he had received fresh threats from Jamaat-e-Islami, Jamat-ud-Dawa, the group formed by Lashkar-e-Toiba founder Hafiz Mohammad Saeed, 'jehadi' organisations and radical Islamist groups for taking up Sarabjit's case and securing the release of another Indian death row prisoner, Kashmir Singh.
He said the government "has exposed me and my family to extreme danger by withdrawing my guards. But I will continue with my mission of safeguarding human rights and human dignity without any fear or discrimination."
"I am fighting for humans and human dignity and the present government has thrown me in front of wolves. But these actions will not make me weaker," said Burney, the Chairman of the Ansar Burney Trust.
He also criticised the Interior Ministry chief Rehman Malik for what he described as "hypocrisy and double speak".
"The extreme of hypocrisy is that the government announced it would convert all death sentences into life imprisonment. Even after that announcement, four prisoners have been hanged so far. It looks like this announcement was made just to get international appreciation," he said.
"On one side, the Pakistan government issues statements on sympathetically considering Sarabjit's case and on the other hand, they are spreading canards to bring embarrassment to a person like me who is working on his case and trying to bring India and Pakistan closer," he added.
Burney also claimed there were a "few living Indian Prisoners of War in Pakistani jails" and the government was reluctant to hand over to India the ashes of "PoWs who had died in jails". He said he would visit India again in December to take up such issues.
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
)
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
)
)
)
)
)
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}