![[Pakistan] Female UN staff members working in quake-affected areas of northern Pakistan have worked hard to adhere to local sensitivities and customs in terms of dress codes. [Date picture taken: 09/10/2006]](https://assets.thenewhumanitarian.org/s3fs-public/styles/responsive_large_2x/public/images/2006991.jpg.webp?itok=tQjsABBy "UN staff members adhere to local dress codes")
The United Nations (UN) in northern Pakistan remains mindful of local customs and traditions following criticism by some religious clerics in the quake-affected region that some members of the humanitarian community had not been observing appropriate behaviour and dress codes in their employment of women.
“The UN is already conscious of local customs and has taken appropriate measures to ensure that UN staff continue to be mindful and respectful to such sensitivities,” Shafqatullah Cheema, the UN’s Area Coordinator for Muzaffarabad, confirmed to IRIN on Monday in Muzaffarabad, capital of quake-devastated Pakistani-administered Kashmir.
Earlier last month, Muslim clerics reportedly told aid agencies to fire all local female employees or face violent reprisals, following what they described as “obscene” activities on the part of NGOs working in the area.
“We have told the administration [district officials] that we won’t allow NGOs to exploit our women and asked them to give a date suitable for the removal of all female workers,” Syed Atta Ullah Shah of the Bagh central mosque in Pakistani-administered Kashmir, reportedly said at the time.
“They hire beautiful girls and take them to Islamabad for enjoyment,” Shah claimed, adding that women were being kept in the offices as decoration pieces as they knew that women had no work and that there was no such work that a man could not do.
Meanwhile, local authorities in Pakistan’s rugged North West Frontier Province - the other area devastated by the 8 October quake last year, which killed more than 75,000 people and left 3.5 million homeless - reportedly even went to the extent of drawing up a code of conduct for the NGOs to follow.
“We have constituted a coordination committee that will issue guidelines to the NGOs about dress codes, the local culture and values,” Sardar Yousuf, the district mayor of Mansehra, told Reuters at the time.
The coordination committee was comprised of clerics, army officers, local officials and NGO representatives, the report said.
“Generally, many of them [NGOs] know how to conduct themselves. But we don’t want to hear anyone complaining about their dressing or conduct and creating an issue,” Yousuf maintained.
“We advise them [women] to wear proper fitting clothes that keep the body and head covered,” he explained, adding: “The NGOs have done a lot of work in the affected areas and we don’t want that derailed due to local insensitivities”.
But according to Cheema, while maintaining that the UN had experienced no problems in their employment of female staff members in the field, he conceded that he had heard of some incidents involving a few smaller local NGOs working in the area.
“Larger international NGOs with years of experience working in such areas have not had any problems,” he said.
Such incidents were largely a rarity, the UN official explained, as was the rhetoric that followed, noting that Pakistani-administered Kashmir had one of the most progressive populations in the country when it came to gender-equality, education and literacy rates.
“The public at large is very friendly and welcoming to the UN and humanitarian community,” Cheema stressed. “Such incidents do of course happen, but on the part of the United Nations, we work hard to remain respectful of local customs and traditions,” he repeated.
Female aid workers in the area told IRIN that like many Islamic countries, women in Pakistan were expected to cover their arms and legs with loose clothing, as well as cover their hair. Women should always cover their hair in mosques, they added.
DS/JL/AT
“The UN is already conscious of local customs and has taken appropriate measures to ensure that UN staff continue to be mindful and respectful to such sensitivities,” Shafqatullah Cheema, the UN’s Area Coordinator for Muzaffarabad, confirmed to IRIN on Monday in Muzaffarabad, capital of quake-devastated Pakistani-administered Kashmir.
Earlier last month, Muslim clerics reportedly told aid agencies to fire all local female employees or face violent reprisals, following what they described as “obscene” activities on the part of NGOs working in the area.
“We have told the administration [district officials] that we won’t allow NGOs to exploit our women and asked them to give a date suitable for the removal of all female workers,” Syed Atta Ullah Shah of the Bagh central mosque in Pakistani-administered Kashmir, reportedly said at the time.
“They hire beautiful girls and take them to Islamabad for enjoyment,” Shah claimed, adding that women were being kept in the offices as decoration pieces as they knew that women had no work and that there was no such work that a man could not do.
Meanwhile, local authorities in Pakistan’s rugged North West Frontier Province - the other area devastated by the 8 October quake last year, which killed more than 75,000 people and left 3.5 million homeless - reportedly even went to the extent of drawing up a code of conduct for the NGOs to follow.
“We have constituted a coordination committee that will issue guidelines to the NGOs about dress codes, the local culture and values,” Sardar Yousuf, the district mayor of Mansehra, told Reuters at the time.
The coordination committee was comprised of clerics, army officers, local officials and NGO representatives, the report said.
“Generally, many of them [NGOs] know how to conduct themselves. But we don’t want to hear anyone complaining about their dressing or conduct and creating an issue,” Yousuf maintained.
“We advise them [women] to wear proper fitting clothes that keep the body and head covered,” he explained, adding: “The NGOs have done a lot of work in the affected areas and we don’t want that derailed due to local insensitivities”.
But according to Cheema, while maintaining that the UN had experienced no problems in their employment of female staff members in the field, he conceded that he had heard of some incidents involving a few smaller local NGOs working in the area.
“Larger international NGOs with years of experience working in such areas have not had any problems,” he said.
Such incidents were largely a rarity, the UN official explained, as was the rhetoric that followed, noting that Pakistani-administered Kashmir had one of the most progressive populations in the country when it came to gender-equality, education and literacy rates.
“The public at large is very friendly and welcoming to the UN and humanitarian community,” Cheema stressed. “Such incidents do of course happen, but on the part of the United Nations, we work hard to remain respectful of local customs and traditions,” he repeated.
Female aid workers in the area told IRIN that like many Islamic countries, women in Pakistan were expected to cover their arms and legs with loose clothing, as well as cover their hair. Women should always cover their hair in mosques, they added.
DS/JL/AT
This article was produced by IRIN News while it was part of the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. Please send queries on copyright or liability to the UN. For more information: https://shop.un.org/rights-permissions
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