Rights group sets up first ever helpline

A rights group is setting up the first ever helpline for victims of human rights violations in Pakistan, with a particular focus on North West Frontier Province (NWFP), according to the group's head. "In Pakistan, this kind of helpline is being set up for the first time," Liaqat Banori, the chairman of the Society for the Protection of Human Rights and Prisoners' Aid (SHARP), told IRIN from Peshawar, the capital of the NWFP which borders strife-torn Afghanistan. "Moreover, we are doing it on our own, on a self-financing basis. We are not getting any donations... It is the first ever self-financed project of its kind," he stressed. The organisation was already holding meetings with the police, local government officials and the judiciary, Banori said. "We have organised a mechanism with these people," he explained. "Secondly, we have involved the media. We are [also] going to utilise the services of the clerics, which play a very important part here in this area, in sensitisations particularly," he added. He said that, according to a recent survey conducted by SHARP, the media is particularly influential with 27 percent of the Pakistani population while the remaining 73 percent are mainly influenced by these religious clerics. The group would focus particularly on the NWFP where human rights violations were reported very regularly, he said. "We have chosen this part of the country because we think that there is a dire need for having such a facility in this area. And we will issue the numbers about how many violations occur in just one month at the end of March," he added. The organisation would monitor human rights violations fastidiously, Banori said. "We will focus particularly on police torture, which is routine in this country. Also on domestic violence, which is not considered violence in Pakistan. Rather, in the NWFP, it is considered a privilege," he fumed. Human trafficking was another serious issue SHARP intended to monitor, the lawyer and activist said. "We will sensitise people by organising seminars and workshops under this project," he said.