After the European Union and the United Kingdom, the United States has also raised concerns over the recent sentencing of 25  civilians by military courts for their involvement in the nationwide May 9 riots last year. The series of concerns come after a military court last week sentenced 25 PTI activists to imprisonment ranging from two to 10 years for their involvement in  the May 9, 2023 riots, which broke out following the arrest of PTI founder Imran Khan. While the PTI “rejected” the sentences, lawyers had also questioned the proceedings and the “disproportionately high conviction rate”. 

In a post on X today, US State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller said: “The United States is concerned by the sentencing of Pakistani civilians in a  military tribunal and calls upon Pakistani authorities to respect the right to a fair trial and due process.” His post echoed a State Department statement  released yesterday, which expressed “deep concern” over the military court verdicts. The statement came just hours after the UK’s Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office (FCDO) had echoed the same reservations. “While the UK respects Pakistan’s sovereignty over its own legal proceedings, trying civilians in military courts lacks transparency, independent scrutiny and undermines the right to a fair trial.

We call on the Government of Pakistan to uphold its obligations under the [ICCPR],” the FCDO statement said. A day after the sentences were announced, an EU spokesperson had also described the verdicts as “being inconsistent with the obligations that Pakistan has undertaken under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR)”. The EU spokesperson recalled that under the EU’s Generalised Scheme of Preferences Plus (GSP+), beneficiary countries, including Pakistan, have voluntarily agreed to implement effectively 27 international core conventions, including the ICCPR, in order to continue benefitting from GSP+ status.

Credit: Independent News Pakistan (INP)