LAHORE - There were 1,532 pending cases with the Commission of Inquiries on Enforced Disappearances (CIED) in the beginning of 2018 and 116 more cases were registered in February 2018 alone, a report said Wednesday.

To counter the prevailing situation, more than 100 Pakistani academicians and intellectuals from 49 different universities have signed a petition against enforced disappearances in the country. They include novelist Bapsi Sidwa, historian Ayesha Jalal, political scientist Rasul Bux Raees, Saeed Shafqat, Tariq Rahman, Muhammad Waseem, Kauser and others. The petition was drafted by a group of academics from various universities.

Several protests are staged against enforced disappearances every week by Pashtun and Baloch organisations as well as civil society in Quetta, Karachi, Hyderabad, Lahore, Islamabad and other parts of the country.

Naeemul Haq of FC College says, “This is quite significant that such big names of Pakistani academics from 49 different universities within the country and abroad have signed it.”

The petition titled, “The policy of enforced disappearances is Illegal, Inhuman and counterproductive”, has been addressed to President Mamnoon Hussain, Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi, Chief Justice Mian Saqib Nisar and Chief of Army Staff General Qamar Javed Bajwa.

The petition states, “We, the undersigned, are deeply distressed by what appears to be official policy to rely upon the practice of enforced disappearance as a means of narrowing the bounds of allowable speech in Pakistan.”

“As teachers and academics, we are concerned that the practice of enforced disappearance is being used to create fear and insecurity amongst the very people who are creative and intellectuals of our nation. The voice of those who struggle for a collective conscience and thriving cultures of critical debate are also being silenced through enforced disappearances,” the petition says.

“We have a firm belief that no threats to the nation are grave enough to justify recourse to enforced disappearances as the state policy. We feel that our system of justice is robust enough to deal with legitimate threats through procedural justice. Without recourse to law, the victims of forced disappearances are political prisoners and prisoners of conscience,” the petition states.

The petition adds: “The practice of enforced disappearances is violation of citizens’ human, social and political rights under the constitution of Pakistan’s articles 4, 9, 10 & 14, and articles 3, 5, 6, 9, 10 and 19 of Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

“We consider enforced disappearances as antithetical to democratic development and a civilised society. These are also counterproductive to the nation and peace-building,” it reads.

The academics also called upon political parties to play their role in expanding democratic space by resisting this practice.

Human Rights Commission of Pakistan also urged Pakistani authorities to take robust measures to end the illegal practice of enforced disappearance and bring the perpetrators to justice.