London, June 5 (IANS) A leading international human rights organisation strongly condemned the treatment of the Ahmadiyya Muslim community in Pakistan during the Eid-ul-Adha celebration this year, accusing authorities of intensifying surveillance, arrests, and restrictions targeting Ahmadis.
Expressing grave concern, the UK-based International Human Rights Committee (IHRC) said that Pakistani authorities, alongside the extremist groups across several regions in the country, intensified measures aimed at preventing Ahmadis from observing one of the most important religious occasions in the Islamic calendar.
“These incidents occurred against the backdrop of a coordinated nationwide campaign by extremist organisations, bar associations, and anti-Ahmadi pressure groups who openly called upon authorities to prevent Ahmadis from observing Eid-ul-Adha. In the days leading up to the festival, several legal and bar associations and religious groups issued statements and letters demanding restrictions on Ahmadi religious practices and urging police action against Ahmadis engaged in Eid-related activities,” the IHRC stated.
The rights body documented several incidents during Eid-ul-Adha in which Ahmadis were detained or arrested for carrying out religious activities on private premises.
It further stated that police in multiple districts of Pakistan confiscated animals owned by Ahmadis, with such actions beginning even before the start of the festival.
“These pre-emptive measures demonstrate a systematic campaign aimed at obstructing Ahmadi religious observance and denying community members the ability to practise their faith peacefully,” the IHRC noted.
According to the rights body, the arrests and legal actions carried out against Ahmadis during Eid-ul-Adha are not isolated incidents but form part of a broader pattern of persecution enabled by Pakistan’s discriminatory legal framework.
The IHRC called on the government of Pakistan to immediately cease the targeting of Ahmadis for engaging in peaceful religious practices and to end the surveillance, monitoring, and reporting mechanisms used to interfere with private religious observance.
It also urged the authorities to release all individuals detained solely for exercising their right to freedom of religion or belief and to withdraw cases arising from peaceful religious activities carried out during Eid-ul-Adha.
The IHRC further called on the international community, including the United Nations Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Religion or Belief, the United Nations Human Rights Council, the European Union, the Commonwealth, and democratic governments worldwide, to raise these incidents with Pakistani authorities and press for meaningful reforms to protect the fundamental rights of the Ahmadiyya Muslim community.
“The events of Eid-ul-Adha 2026 demonstrate that Ahmadis in Pakistan continue to face a system of discrimination that extends beyond public life and into the privacy of their own homes. No individual should face arrest, detention, surveillance, or criminal prosecution simply for observing a religious festival peacefully and within the confines of private property,” it stated.
–IANS
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