Bakhtawar Jaffri, a Shia rights activist in Punjab, said she had recently filed a police report for anti-Shia hate speech but it had been ignored. Throughout the year, Islamic organizations with varying degrees of political affiliation held conferences and rallies to support the doctrine of Khatm-e-Nabuwat. Unofficial estimates vary widely with regard to the size of minority religious groups. In July, religious and right-wing parties criticized the governments plan to permit construction of a new Hindu temple in Islamabad. The name also comes from one of the names of Allah, Al-Wahab, which means the all-giver.. Courts also penalized antiblasphemy groups. This was part of an increase in anti-Shia activity that month nationwide that included the shooting of a prominent Shia religious leader in Punjabs Mandi Bahauddin District and the shooting of a Shia employee of the National Bank of Pakistan in Islamabad. On February 7, the district administration returned a century-old Hindu temple to the Hindu community in Zhob, Balochistan. On October 5, also in Peshawar, Professor Naeemuddin Khattak, a member of the Ahmadiyya community, died after being shot while driving home from work. The government continued its warnings against blasphemy and other illegal content on social media through periodic print advertisements and text messages sent by the Pakistan Telecommunications Authority (PTA). On October 10, 1993, the then Central government had announced elected . In 2017, TLP was responsible for forcing a law minister to quit over a perceived softening in the blasphemy laws. Lawmakers from the National Assembly, the Sindh Provincial Assembly, and the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Provincial Assembly also adopted resolutions requiring the title last of the prophets to be used when referring to Mohammed. On October 7, Dr. Qibla Ayaz, then chairman of the Council of Islamic Ideology, inaugurated a national code of conduct to promote interreligious harmony in the face of increased sectarian violence and mistreatment of religious minorities. The anti-Shia Muslim campaign first began gathering pace on social media in September, demanding that Shia Muslims were declared heretics. The author of the article wrote that COVID-19 had been hidden since the 1960s to be used against Muslims.. Answer (1 of 19): The country Iran has the largest population of Shia. NGOs, legal observers and religious minority representatives continued to raise concerns regarding the failure of lower courts to adhere to basic evidentiary standards in blasphemy cases, and the slow pace of adjudicating these cases, which led to some suspects remaining in detention for years as they waited their initial trial or appeals, and to some convicted persons spending years in prison before higher courts overturned their convictions and freed them for lack of evidence. On August 24, the Karachi center hosted a talk entitled, How to Develop Religious Tolerance and Empathy, with Syed Ali Hameed from the Shaoor Foundation and a consulate general officer. They represent about 21 per cent of the total Muslim population, the highest number in a country after Iran. Median age total: 33.7 years male: 33.1 years The HRCP reported that more than 40 such cases were registered under the blasphemy laws in August alone. The requirement that Muslim elected officials swear an oath affirming their belief that Mohammed is the final prophet of Islam continued to discourage Ahmadi Muslims from seeking public office. Pakistan's president gives Shias an exemption, but the sectarian confrontation becomes an important political issue in the country. Parents may send children to private schools, including religious schools, at the familys expense. Throughout the year, unidentified individuals assaulted and killed Shia and Ahmadis in attacks sources believed to be religiously motivated. 3. is smallest province by Population. She said Domki had taken her to Balochistan two months earlier and held her there until police rescued her. Phillip Smyth was a Soref Fellow at The Washington Institute from 2018-2021. According to the nonprofit Middle East Media Research Institute, the December edition of the Urdu language TTP magazine Journal of The Tehreek-E-Taliban Pakistan blamed the Jews and their puppets for the COVID-19 pandemic and for harassing Muslims during the pandemic. In October, members of a State Youth Parliament team in Gujranwala defaced a public portrait of the countrys first Nobel laureate, physicist Dr. Abdus Salam, an Ahmadi. The government announced it would seek a review from the Council on Islamic Ideology and at the end of the year it was unclear whether it still maintained its support for the temple. (Goyal, 2020) There has been an even greater decline in major cities with historically large Hindu populations. The two major powers in the Middle East are Saudi Arabia, an Arab population ruled by a Sunni majority, and Iran, a Persian population ruled by a Shia majority. Updated April 2020 About the Authors. Sunnis are generally believed to be 80-85 percent of the Muslim population, and Shia Muslims, including Hazara, Ismaili, and Bohra (a branch of Ismaili), are generally believed to make up 15-20 percent. The Charge dAffaires, consuls general, other embassy officers, and visiting senior U.S. officials engaged government officials and senior advisors to the Prime Minister, including the Minister for Human Rights, and officials from the Ministry of Law and Justice, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Ministry of Interior, Ministry of Federal Education and Professional Training, and Ministry of Religious Affairs and Interfaith Harmony to discuss blasphemy law reform; laws concerning Ahmadi Muslims; the need to better protect members of religious minority communities; sectarian relations; and religious respect. On October 6, the Lahore High Court acquitted Sawan Masih, a Christian man sentenced to death for blasphemy in 2014, but Masih continued to face death threats and had to go into hiding with his family. This is probably an attempt to contain any outbreak of violence, because Shias in Pakistan are a sizeable minority. Speaker of the Punjab Provincial Assembly and Pakistan Muslim League-Quaid (PML-Q) party leader Chaudhry Pervaiz Elahi made numerous statements denouncing Ahmadis and any effort to undermine the status of Mohammed as Islams final prophet. In January, after going missing, a 15-year-old Hindu girl appeared in a video with Ali Raza, a Muslim man, in which the two claimed they had willingly married and she had converted to Islam. Police arrested more than 45 JUI-F followers and clerics involved in the destruction. Neither the National Assembly nor the Senate had acted on the 2018 judgment by years end, but Ahmadiyya community representatives said that NADRA required Ahmadis to declare in an affidavit that they are non-Muslims to obtain a national identification card, another requirement of the high court judgment. Representatives of religious minorities said a glass ceiling continued to prevent their promotion to senior government positions, but one NGO also stated that due to insufficient higher education opportunities compared to the majority religious community, few religious minorities met the qualifications to apply for these positions. On October 11, unidentified militants abducted six Shia pilgrims near the Pakistan-Iran border region of Panjgur, in Balochistan. On September 30, media reported that a 17-year-old girl from a Hindu Dalit community committed suicide after having been gang-raped a year earlier by Muslim men and subsequently blackmailed by them in Tharparkar, Sindh. The 16-year-old suspect was being tried as a juvenile; the two coconspirators were a prayer leader and a young lawyer involved in the blasphemy complaint against Naseem. The Sindh provincial cabinet adopted regulations to implement the Sindh Hindu Marriage Act in December 2019, which provided more specific rules for implementation. Following petitions, the court reversed its decision and declared the marriage illegal under the Sindh Child Marriage Restraint Act and ordered the girl placed in a shelter after she refused to return to her parents. Shia Muslims mourning the death anniversary of Imam Hussain, the grandson of the Prophet Mohammed, in Karachi on 8 October. Ahmadi community leaders said they saw the requirement to designate Mohammed as last of the prophets as directly targeting them. Estimates of the Zikri Muslim community, located in Balochistan, range between 500,000 and 800,000 individuals. At other times, advocacy groups reported that blasphemy trials were held inside jails for security reasons, in which case the hearings were not public, resulting in a gain in immediate security but a loss of transparency. There is no option to state no religion. National identity cards are required for all citizens upon reaching the age of 18. The law prohibits publishing any criticism of Islam or its prophets or insults to others religious beliefs. According to the SATP, at least 10 persons were killed and three injured in 10 incidents of sectarian violence by extremist groups during the year. Religious community representatives estimate religious groups not identifying as Sunni, Shia, or Ahmadi Muslim constitute 3 to 5 percent of the population. Qataris are all Muslims and followers of the Sunni Salafi version of Islam. In its 2020 World Watch List report, the international NGO Open Doors listed Pakistan, noting that Christians face extreme persecution in every area of their lives, with converts from Islam facing the highest levels. According to Open Doors, all Christians in the country are considered second-class citizens, inferior to Muslims. The NGO stated Christians are often given jobs perceived as low, dirty and dishonorable, and can even be victims of bonded labor. The NGO also said that Christian girls in the country were increasingly at risk of abduction and rape, often forced to marry their attackers and coerced into converting to Islam.. According to representatives of some minority religious groups, the government continued to allow most organized religious groups to establish places of worship and train members of the clergy. Shia Numbers are in the range of 320 Millions to 350 Millions and according to some estimates its in the range of 400 Millions. On October 5, also in Peshawar, Ahmadi professor Naeemuddin Khattak was shot and killed while driving home from work. These conferences were organized by groups that stated they were defending the teaching that Mohammed is the final prophet but were often characterized by both secular and Ahmadi critics as engaging in hate speech against Ahmadi Muslims. Dr Nauman Naqvi, an associate professor at Habib University in Karachi, said: Since Pakistans economic and political outlook appears increasingly troubled, the ruling power see Sunni majoritarian populism as the only option to secure stability, undercut democratic forces and distract from the grave political and economic crises that hover over Pakistan. The protesters said that when they opposed the illegal evictions of villagers, they were charged in fake cases by revenue officials. Students who identify themselves as Muslims must declare in writing they believe Mohammed is the final prophet. Pakistan's population is expected to surpass that of Indonesia in 2048 when it will reach 331.29 million. On February 22, a Christian woman from Lahore fled to a shelter after a Muslim factory worker forced her to convert to Islam and marry him. The government continued to prohibit citizens, regardless of religious affiliation, from traveling to Israel. Police stated they believed he was targeted because of his religious beliefs. The incident was the first attack on a Hindu temple in Tharparkar in more than 30 years. Jaffar made his remarks in Arabic, which were then aired on a popular Karachi news station, 24 News HD. Visiting U.S. government officials met with religious minority community representatives, parliamentarians, human rights activists, and members of the federal cabinet to highlight concerns regarding the treatment of religious minority communities, the application of blasphemy laws, and other forms of discrimination on the basis of religion. In July, residents in the Sheikpura District of Punjab damaged Ahmadi gravestones. Sanjay Mathrani, a former participant in a U.S. government exchange program, was a featured speaker. Processing and dissemination of data in the form of Census Reports. Shias, who make up 15 percent of Pakistan's 220 million population, commemorate the seventh-century massacre of the Prophet Muhammad's grandson Imam Husayn and his family and friends at the Battle of Karbala in Iraq for refusing . Edit: August and September of 2020 has seen a renewed attack on Shia Muslims within Pakistan. Ahmadiyya community members said they were surprised by this instance of a senior government official condemning anti-Ahmadi violence, but added that they do not expect it to become the new norm. Christian religious freedom activists continued to report widespread discrimination against Christians in private employment. An Ahmadi trader in Peshawar was shot near his business on August 12. [see also: Population country ranks ] Nationality: However, violence is inevitable because the anger and anxiety on both sides seem to be mounting. U.S. government cultural centers in Khairpur, Hyderabad, and Karachi held events to promote religious freedom. On August 23, the Sindh provincial government barred 142 firebrand speakers and religious scholars from leaving their home districts for 60 days to avoid violent disturbances during Shia Muharram commemorations. In July, a teenager killed U.S. citizen Tahir Naseem in a Peshawar courtroom, where Naseem was on trial for blasphemy. CLAAS helped both file an antidiscrimination petition in the Lahore High Court. Pakistan's Human Rights Commission reported more than 200 terrorist attacks resulted in nearly 700 Shia deaths and over 1,000 Shia injuries in 2013. In May, after the government announced that Ahmadis would be excluded from the National Commission for Minorities, Religious Affairs Minister Qadri said on a popular television show, Anyone supporting Ahmadis is not a Muslim. Ahmadiyya Muslim community representatives stated that the Urdu-language press frequently printed hate speech in news stories and editorials, some of which could be considered as inciting anti-Ahmadi violence. The NCHR is also mandated to monitor the governments implementation of human rights and review and propose legislation. I fear they will kill me, said Kareem, his voice shaking as he spoke from his place of hiding. Persons accused of blasphemy were often simultaneously charged with terrorism offenses. Government officials condemned the incident, suspended more than 100 police officials for failure to stop the mob, and ordered the temple rebuilt. rate of urbanization: 2.1% annual rate of change (2020-25 est.) Vali Nasr claims the Shia . The court ordered police to hand over the woman to her Hindu husband and no police or court action was taken against Domki. On July 19, members of the Hindu community staged a sit-in in Khuzdar, Balochistan, to protest the July 18 killing of local Hindu trader Nanak Ram by unidentified assailants in the Wadh area of Khuzdar District. Shias in Pakistan are geographically spread across the. The FSCs review power applies whether the cases involve Muslims or non-Muslims. Some court judgments have considered the marriage of a non-Muslim woman to a non-Muslim man dissolved if she converts to Islam, although the marriage of a non-Muslim man who converts remains recognized. Ahmadi representatives said the wording of the declaration students were required to sign on their applications for admission to universities continued to prevent Ahmadis from declaring themselves as Muslims. The constitution establishes a Council of Islamic Ideology to make recommendations, at the request of the parliament and provincial assemblies, as to the ways and means of enabling and encouraging Muslims to order their lives in accordance with the principles of Islam. The constitution further empowers the council to advise the legislative and executive branches when they choose to refer a question to the council as to whether a proposed law is or is not repugnant to the injunctions of Islam.. Salman Khan, the head of the Muslim family, remained at large. In court proceedings, the girl retracted her video statement and said she wanted to return to her parents. Shia Muslims also fear their religious freedom is being legislated away. Projections 0 100,000,000 200,000,000 300,000,000 400,000,000 Population 235,824,862 The 104-member Senate has four reserved seats for non-Muslims, one from each province. On November 9, also in Peshawar, an 82-year-old retired Ahmadi government worker was killed by unknown gunmen while waiting for a bus. On April 14, police filed a blasphemy case against Shia singer Zamin Ali in Jamshoro, Sindh. On July 13, hundreds of members of the Bheel community, including women and children, marched and demonstrated against the demolition of their homes by revenue officials whom they said were in collusion with an influential landlord of the area in Mithi, Sindh. According to Ahmadiyya leaders, the government effectively disenfranchised their community by requiring voters to swear an oath affirming the finality of the Prophethood of Mohammed, something that they stated was against Ahmadi belief, in order to register as Muslims. The government said Ahmadis could qualify for admission if they did not claim to be Muslims. . The law bans the sale of Ahmadiyya religious literature. Minority rights activists criticized these advertisements as discriminatory and insulting. India with 21 million is in second place closely followed by Pakistan (20 million). The constitution reserves seats for non-Muslim members in both the national and provincial assemblies. Civil society members reported authorities took no action to prevent attacks on Ahmadi mosques or punish assailants who demolished, damaged, forcibly occupied, or set fire to Ahmadi mosques. Other NGOs also said that 2020 had seen an increase in blasphemy cases. In Islamabad, the deputy inspector general of police said as many as 15,000 police, Rangers, and Frontier Corps personnel were involved. Minority rights activists said most government employment advertisements for janitorial staff continued to list being non-Muslim as a requirement. The court may suspend or increase the sentence given by a criminal court in these cases. Although there were no official obstacles to the advancement of minority religious group members in the military, they said that in practice, non-Muslims rarely rose above the rank of colonel and were not assigned to senior positions. February 27, 2023 . . 2,724,000. In February, a court in Jacobabad, Sindh, ruled that the marriage with Raza was illegal under the 2013 Sindh Child Marriage Restraint Act. The teacher survived the attack and told media the man had been following and harassing her for days. NEW DELHI: Successive Pakistan governments under the garb of development have undertaken an exercise to change demographic composition of Gilgit Baltistan and local Shia population has been reduced to less than 50 per cent compared to 1948. Subsequently, Arfana Mallah, a professor at Sindh University Jamshoro who criticized Soomros arrest and the blasphemy laws, was herself accused of committing blasphemy and had to apologize publicly. Members of religious minority communities stated public schools gave Muslim students bonus grade points for memorizing the Quran, but there were no analogous opportunities for extra academic credit available for religious minority students. At the end of the year, CLAAS was planning to take the case to the Federal Ombudsman. On December 2, the Secretary of State redesignated Pakistan as a CPC under the International Religious Freedom Act of 1998, as amended, for having engaged in or tolerated severe violations of religious freedom, and announced a waiver of the sanctions that accompany designation as required in the important national interests of the United States. Minority lawmakers and civil society activists reacted strongly to the attack, stating the boys had been instigated by local Muslim clerics. As a result, the maps are designed to give a general overview of where significant Shia population centers, zones of influence, and points of interest . Shiites are estimated to be 21-35 percent of the Muslim population in South East Asia. Some religious minority leaders stated the system of selecting minority parliamentarians through the internal deliberations of mainstream parties resulted in the appointment of party stalwarts or those who could afford to buy the seats, rather than legislators who genuinely represented minority communities. Sources vary on the precise breakdown of the Muslim population between Sunni and Shia Muslims. The Religious Affairs Ministry later issued a statement saying Ahmadis would not be included on the commission, given the religious and historical sensitivity of including Ahmadis in government institutions. The economy will contract by 1.3 percent in the 2020 fiscal year because of the pandemic, the World Bank predicts. These attacks targeted gatherings of Shia individuals. Even Fawad Chaudhry, currently serving as the minister for science and technology in Khans government, conceded that sectarianism was an issue that was getting out of hand. The Sindh High Court on October 27 originally upheld the validity of the marriage, citing the marriage certificate that indicated the girl was 18 years old, and ruling that she had converted to Islam and married of her own free will. Since 1980s, Parachinar, with majority Shia population, has seen the emergence of radical Saudi-sponsored Salafist groups, and sectarian violence has become a disturbing phenomenon, fueled by local and global terrorist organizations like the Taliban and ISIS. According to AsiaNews, once Khan learned the family was Christian, he ordered them to leave immediately, because Christians are enemies of Islam. After harassing the family for a few days, Khan gave them a 24-hour ultimatum to leave. The constitution states no person shall be compelled to pay any special tax for the propagation or maintenance of a religion other than the persons own. The attackers relationship to organized terrorist groups was often unclear. On August 30, police charged Shia cleric Taqqi Jaffar with blasphemy for criticizing Mohammeds companions during a Karachi Muharram procession. The 342-member National Assembly has 10 reserved seats for non-Muslims. ASWJ had previously been banned in Pakistan under the Anti-Terrorism Act before it was lifted in 2018 but is still globally considered a terrorist organisation. The CLAAS legal team filed a contempt of court application, but the Lahore High Court dismissed the plea. Many have observed that outrage against Shia. The PTA cited public complaints against an unauthentic version of the Quran uploaded by the Ahmadiyya community on the Google Play Store and information that portrayed Mirza Masroor Ahmad as a Muslim on Wikipedia, which the PTA characterized as misleading, wrong, deceptive, and deceitful. The PTA successfully removed the same Quran application from the Apple Store in July. There were multiple reports of targeted killings of Shia Muslims in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, although because religion and ethnicity were often closely related, it was difficult to categorize some incidents as being solely based on religious identity. Ahmadi Muslim leaders said they had never been approached about participating in the commission and would never join a body that required them to identify as non-Muslims. Most minority religious groups said they continued to face discrimination in government hiring. The government may use the antiterrorism courts, established as a parallel legal structure under the 1997 Antiterrorism Act, to try cases involving violent crimes, terrorist activities, and acts or speech deemed by the government to foment religious hatred, including blasphemy. According to the 2017 census results, the population is 1.6 percent Hindu, 1.6 percent Christian, 0.2 percent Ahmadi Muslim, and 0.3 percent others, to include Bahais, Sikhs, and Zoroastrians. At first, they used hashtags, then killed us and rallied against us. According to eyewitnesses, police officials in at least four police vans cordoned off the area and arrested Soomro, who initially resisted. The establishment of the UT of Ladakh was in concurrence with the age-old demand of Leh, a demand opposed by Kargil. In January, two Christians, Kamran Sandhu and Nauman Aslam, applied for seats reserved for minorities in the Gujranwala Electric Power Company (GEPCO) in Punjab. Shia Muslims constitute 10 to 12 percent of the citizen population and an estimated 25 to 30 percent of the Eastern Province's population. Advisory Commission on Public Diplomacy, 2020 Report on International Religious Freedom, Section II. 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