Authorities ban Women’s Day March in Lahore. Eastern city Authorities of Lahore have refused permission for a rally to mark International Women’s Day, which often meets a fierce backlash in the country.
Marches held in main cities all over Pakistan since 2018 to get attention to women’s rights.
Lahore city authorities mentioned the “controversial cards and banners” normally displayed by participants in the march. And security concerns as reasons after the decision, which laid out in a notification to march organizers late Friday.
Counter-protests called “Haya (modesty)” marches normally staged by religious groups to call for the preservation of Islamic values.
“It’s a violation of our rights. This raises questions about the state’s ability to manage the right to freedom of assembly for both groups.” Hiba Akbar, an organizer for Aurat (women’s) March Lahore, told AFP.
Lahore authorities allowed this year’s Haya March to held although the ban on the Aurat March.
Organisers of the Aurat March in Pakistan have frequently had to resort to legal action to counter attempts to ban it.
The Aurat March rallies have seen controversy because of banners and placards waved by members that increase subjects such as divorce and sexual harassment.
Organizers and participants accused of promoting Western, liberal values and insulting religious and cultural sensitivities.
Hundreds of women killed by men in Pakistan each year over “honour”.
Rights group Amnesty International said the Lahore decision “amounts to an unlawful and unnecessary restriction of the right to assembly”.
Authorities in the capital Islamabad, mentioning security concerns. Referred the Aurat March to a city park where a woman gang raped in February.
“We are a feminist movement, we will not be in parks but rather on the streets,” a declaration by march organizers there said.
Authorities ban Women’s Day March in Lahore. In 2020, groups of hardline men turned up in vans and threw stones at women participating in the Aurat March.
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Women have long fought for basic rights in Pakistan, where activists say men commit “pervasive and intractable” violence beside them.