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Old Tuesday, November 23, 2010
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In the same year, a journalist,33 Amir Mohammad Khan, visited the central prison, Haripur, to verify claims of civil society that under section 40 of the FCR the government has sentenced minor children on the pretext of being relatives of an alleged offender. He narrated the ordeal that “two year old Zarmina sits in her mother’s lap on the veranda in front of the barrack reserved for women prisoners at the Central Prison, Haripur. She begins to cry when she hears the sobs of two children nearby, seven-year-old Iran Khan and his eight-year-old brother Tahir Khan. Tears roll down the children’s cheeks as a sympathetic visitor to the jail asks them about their living conditions in the prison.” Unfortunately, there are more than 15 children, including girls and boys, who are less than ten years old and who are behind bars for crimes that allegedly have been committed by their fathers or other extended family members and in some cases even by someone from their tribe. (SPARC 2004).These children were sentenced to three years imprisonment under the collective responsibility clause of the FCR by the Assistant Political Agent North Waziristan. SPARC (2004) wrote in its report that agencies responsible for law and order in the region had failed to perform their duties therefore they were targeting innocent children and women to bargain with outlaws. “What is the difference between an outlaw kidnapping innocent people for ransom and the governmental agencies kidnapping women and children for their release?” (SPARC 2004) It was all up to the political agent who has the power to either release such innocent women and children or even award them a further three years imprisonment if the fugitive is not arrested during their internment.

There is a clear disparity between the FCR and United Nations standards and guidelines. In this system, there are no chances of a fair trial because the judiciary is not separate from the executive, which according to Article 37, and 40 of the UNCRC, is an open violation of children’s human and legal rights.

Arresting innocent children under the collective responsibility clause of the FCR is against Article 9 of the Constitution of Pakistan which states, “No person shall be deprived of life or liberty save in accordance with the law.” However, the collective responsibility clause of the FCR gives the administration the power to arrest and imprison all or any members of a tribe and confiscate all the property belonging to any of them.

Every child has the right to be presumed innocent until proven guilty, whereas under the FCR system, presumption of innocence is not considered. If a child is a relative of an offender therefore he/she is considered an offender too. Therefore, all arrested and detained children under the collective responsibility clause 21 are considered guilty before their trial starts
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