{"id":9074,"date":"2018-02-14T14:06:40","date_gmt":"2018-02-14T12:06:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/openasia.org\/en\/?p=9074"},"modified":"2018-02-14T14:08:02","modified_gmt":"2018-02-14T12:08:02","slug":"asma-jahangir-fearless-pakistani-rights-activist-dies-at-66","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/openasia.org\/en\/2018\/02\/asma-jahangir-fearless-pakistani-rights-activist-dies-at-66\/","title":{"rendered":"Asma Jahangir, Fearless Pakistani Rights Activist, Dies at 66"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

nytimes<\/a>\u00a0– ISLAMABAD, Pakistan \u2014 Asma Jahangir, a leading Pakistani rights activist, fearless critic of the military\u2019s interference in politics and a staunch defender of the rule of law, died on Sunday in Lahore. She was 66.<\/p>\n

\n
\n

The death was confirmed by her daughter Munizae Jahangir, who said the cause was a heart attack.<\/p>\n

Ms. Jahangir, a human rights lawyer, had a reputation for\u00a0speaking truth to power<\/a>\u00a0and defending the weak and the marginalized and women and minorities against injustice. She\u00a0gained international acclaim<\/a>\u00a0for being the conscience of a country where liberal, secular voices have continuously been under threat.<\/p>\n

She was the founding chairwoman of the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan, an independent group, and was a trustee of the International Crisis Group. She won international awards and served as the United Nations rapporteur on human rights and extrajudicial killings.<\/p>\n

Ms. Jahangir never minced words while defending democracy and human rights, despite threats to her life, both from military dictators and militants. She championed the rights of religious minorities \u2014 especially those who were charged under the country\u2019s blasphemy laws \u2014 and women and men killed in the name of honor.<\/p>\n

Born on Jan. 27, 1952, into an affluent family in Lahore, Asma Jilani Jahangir studied at the Convent of Jesus and Mary, receiving her bachelor\u2019s degree from Kinnaird College in Lahore. She received her law degree from Punjab University in Lahore in 1978.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

\u00a0Ms. Jahangir was exposed to politics and activism at an early age. Her father, Malik Ghulam Jilani, was a civil servant and a left-wing politician who was frequently jailed for opposing military dictators. Ms. Jahangir initially appeared in court to represent her jailed father.<\/div>\n
\n
\n
\"\"<\/p>\n
\n
<\/div>\n<\/div>
Ms. Jahangir, a human rights lawyer, in Lahore in 2014. \u201cI will not leave,\u201d she said. \u201cMy ancestors are buried here, and my life is here.\u201d<\/span>\u00a0Credit<\/span>Arif Ali\/Agence France-Presse \u2014 Getty Images<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Her first foray into politics was in 1969, when she participated in a women\u2019s march to the residence of the governor of Punjab and clashed with the police. In 1983, she was put under house arrest and later imprisoned when she campaigned for women\u2019s rights and democracy during the rule of Gen. Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq.<\/p>\n

In 2007, Pervez Musharraf, then a general, also put her under house arrest as the country\u2019s lawyers and politicians began a movement to restore democracy.<\/p>\n

Ms. Jahangir also worked for the rights of bonded laborers, especially brick kiln workers.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn bonded labor cases, judges would ask me why I had brought those people to the courts who stank,\u201d\u00a0she told Herald,<\/a>\u00a0a local magazine. \u201c \u2018You are here precisely for them,\u2019 I would respond.\u201d<\/p>\n

While Ms. Jahangir was respected internationally, she endured\u00a0bitter criticism from the military<\/a>\u00a0and right-wing nationalists. She was attacked for advocating peace with India, and was often accused of being an Indian agent or a traitor.<\/p>\n

Her criticism of the country\u2019s military and its intelligence agencies made her a target of campaigns on television and social media.<\/p>\n

Some Pakistanis accused her of looking the other way when it came to the corruption of two mainstream political parties, the Pakistan Peoples Party and the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz. They complained that she was single-mindedly focused on criticizing the military.<\/p>\n

In 2012, Ms. Jahangir said that an assassination plot against her had been hatched \u201cat the highest level of the security establishment.\u201d She refused to leave the country despite the threats, however, and told the British newspaper\u00a0The Telegraph<\/a>\u00a0that she would not follow other activists out of the country.<\/p>\n

\n
\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

<\/div>\n<\/div>
Ms. Jahangir, center, in Ahmedabad, India, in 2008. She was placed under house arrest in 1983 and 2007, and imprisoned.<\/span>\u00a0Credit<\/span>Sam Panthaky\/Agence France-Presse \u2014 Getty Images<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cI will not leave,\u201d she said. \u201cMy ancestors are buried here, and my life is here.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ms. Jahangir is survived by her husband, two daughters, a son, two sisters and a brother.<\/p>\n

An active member of bar politics, she was the first female president of the Pakistan Supreme Court\u2019s Bar Association. Till her death, she spoke out against corruption in the legal community and advocated judicial reform.<\/p>\n

She was critical of the proliferation of suo motu notices \u2014 a legal provision that empowers a judge to start a hearing\u00a0on virtually any matter<\/a>. Ms. Jahangir, along with other lawyers and critics of the courts, believed that the justices were overreaching and interfering in the executive sphere.<\/p>\n

To many women in the country, she was an inspiration.<\/p>\n

\u201cAsma Jahangir was a voice of the oppressed and an icon of courage and valor,\u201d said Maryam Nawaz Sharif, the daughter and political heir of former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif. \u201cShe endured so much but chose to be on the right side of history.\u201d<\/p>\n

Critics often questioned her focus on the country\u2019s minorities and on women\u2019s rights. She fended off such criticism as misplaced.<\/p>\n

\u201cYes, I am very unhappy, extremely anguished at human rights violations against Kashmiris in India or against Rohingyas in Burma or, for that matter, Christians in Orissa,\u201d Ms. Jahangir told Herald. \u201cBut obviously I am going to be more concerned of violations taking place in my own house because I am closer to the people who I live with. I have more passion for them.\u201d<\/p>\n

She added, \u201cI think it sounds very hollow if I keep talking about the rights of Kashmiris but do not talk about the rights of a woman in Lahore who is butchered to death.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Asma Jahangir, a leading Pakistani rights activist, fearless critic of the military\u2019s interference in politics and a staunch defender of the rule of law, died on Sunday in Lahore. She was 66.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":14,"featured_media":9075,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[90,85,88,17,49,10],"tags":[247],"class_list":["post-9074","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-editor-selection","category-human-rights","category-slider","category-women","category-womens-rights","category-world","tag-bahrain-human-rights-defender","country-asia"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/openasia.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9074","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/openasia.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/openasia.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/openasia.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/14"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/openasia.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9074"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/openasia.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9074\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9090,"href":"https:\/\/openasia.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9074\/revisions\/9090"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/openasia.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/9075"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/openasia.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9074"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/openasia.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9074"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/openasia.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9074"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}