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Pakistan must do a better job at implementing the already diluted human rights commitments to avoid being seen as a state that just goes through pantomime motions at the UN every four years for the UPR.

The third review Human rights have not improved.

The hunger for barbarity will affect people in their private and public lives, as it obliterates the fine line that separates sanity from lunacy.

A thirst for barbarity The culture of brutality preached over the past several months will leave indelible marks on the people’s psyche.

Currently, environmental rights exist in more than 95 national constitutions while our Constitution doesn’t explicitly recognise the right to a healthy environment and favourable climate, the superior courts have in a catena of decisions held that these rights are part of the fundamental rights embodied in Constitution.

Cloudless climes A clean environment is an inalienable right.

The difference between stupidity and genius is that genius has its limits.

Countering radicalisation through media - The Express Tribune It is the media’s responsibility to develop a counter-narrative that terrorism has no faith

When there is greater gender equality, there are more choices and fewer consequences for the wrong ones.

Women and math Women in many Muslim countries have a higher number of graduates in STEM fields than their counterparts in other nations

We find the Muslim League demanding in 1918, the inclusion in the constitutional arrangement a bill of rights that guaranteed the people equality before law, the right to life, liberty, property, freedom of speech, expression and association, and freedom of the press.
The question that needs to be answered on completion of 70 years of a sort of self-rule is as to how could the rulers forget the dreams we had during the freedom struggle and the advice of the founder of the state, and why did the people let them get away with it?

What freedom meant Why should the minorities alone celebrate Aug 11 with reference to the Quaid’s speech?

It is true that the commercial value which a knowledge of English commands, and the fact that the final examinations of the high schools are conducted in English, cause the secondary schools to be subjected to a certain pressure to introduce prematurely both the teaching of English and its use as a medium of instruction… This tendency however should be corrected in the interest of sound education. As a general rule, a child should not be allowed to learn English as a language until he has made some progress in the primary stages of instruction and has received a thorough grounding in his mother-tongue.

When will we learn? Dr Salam and Iqbal did not know their future careers at the start of their education, nor did they start it in English.

Invest in the health and education of girls have higher levels of economic growth and lower rates of population rise. Sadly, in many Mus­lim countries, there is a common misconception — reinforced by ignorant clerics — that women must stay at home.

The other half Women are rising to the top in the most successful countries.

By the time students get to higher grades where they have access to specialist teachers, for many the damage has already, irretrievably, been done

Education concerns Standards are falling even in the best schools.

Another fine mess
THE tagline in the old Laurel and Hardy movies was “another fine mess”, and was uttered whenever things went wrong for the comic duo, as they often did.

I can imagine some judges in the Supreme Court muttering this to Imran Khan as the joint investigation team charade continues to unfold. Earlier, I had predicted that the apex court would not want to get its hands dirty by taking on the Panama Gate case as it was not an investigative body, and would not wish to appear to take sides in such a deeply divisive and politicised matter.
https://www.dawn.com/news/1340085/another-fine-mess

Another fine mess The JIT finds itself between a rock and a hard place.

Warning signs
RULE of thumb: the wilder, woollier and wackier it gets, the less it all means.

And this week was a whole lot of wild, woolly and wacky.

The JIT fought back, the PML-N piled on — it was vicious and entertaining, ugly and amusing.

But it probably didn’t move the needle much.

Political controversy has a contradiction at its heart. You need progressively larger doses of it to keep the public interested, but bigger and bigger doses of controversy inoculate the public.

The allegations this week were stunning because, stripped bare, they were an ISI versus IB face-off.

Warning signs Messy continuity — it shouldn’t just be within reach, it should have been the only option by now. But it’s not.

Reviving a party
THE Congress Working Committee (CWC) met in New Delhi on June 6, with its president Sonia Gandhi in the chair, to pave the way for elevation of the vice president — her son Rahul — to the presidency by Oct 15.

On major issues like the long-simmering farmers’ unrest as on much else, its contribution to the debate has been a justified denunciation of the BJP government. But it has been calculatedly timid on sensitive issues like attacks on the Dalits and Muslims, and, most revealingly, on the outrages in Kashmir.
https://www.dawn.com/news/1340084/reviving-a-party

Reviving a party The Congress needs an inspiring leadership.