Pakistan’s Christians, for the most part, live an essentially precarious existence. A few manage to flee the country as a last resort to protect themselves and their families. Yet the path to asylum is not an easy one. And even when successful, the journey to permanent status is never guaranteed. Meaning the risk of being sent back is ever-present.
Take the case of Maqsood Bakhsh. He and his family fled Pakistan back in 2012 after two Christians were fatally shot outside a court in Faisalabad some two years earlier; while in police custody, no less. The victims were killed over rumours that they had penned a controversial pamphlet that offended Muslim sensibilities. That Bakhsh was implicated in the blasphemy allegations meant the lives of he and his family were in danger.
Naturally, the primary care of duty rests with the Pakistani state. But that being said, it is unfathomable that after six long years of seeking asylum in Britain — a nation that still likes to trade on the outdated image of fighting for the underdog — all applications have been rejected. On the grounds that the Home Office does not consider this country particularly unsafe for Christians.
This underscores the myopia of the British authorities. Not least because the Christian support group Open Doors World Watch List 2017 ranked Pakistan the fourth most difficult country (of a total of 50) in which to be a Christian. And members of this minority faith are not just at risk from the religious right but terrorist groups, too. The Jamaat-ul-Ahrar, a breakaway outfit of the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) that pledges spiritual allegiance to ISIS, have intermittently targeted churches since 2015. Meanwhile the state has, at best, been ineffective in the face of such targeted hate-crimes.
Yet the Bakhsh case also highlights flaws in the British asylum process. Maqsood holds two post-graduate degrees and had worked as a data analyst here in Pakistan. Parveen, his wife, is a fully-trained neo-natal midwife with 17 years of experience under her belt. But due to their unresolved immigration status neither has been able to work over the last six years; making do with welfare benefits and charity. Thereby ‘playing into’ the narrative prevailing across party divides that provides those who claim asylum in Britain do so only to rip off the country’s welfare state. Thus the only option now available to the Bakhsh family is to legally challenge the Home Office verdict.
And while we wait to see how new Home Secretary Sajid Javid handles this case, we also hope that the Pakistani authorities will create a safer space for the country’s Christian community to live and work peacefully. And we shall continue to remind the government of its vital duty to protect the lives and liberties of citizens regardless of religion, ethnicity or caste. *
Published in Daily Times, June 14th 2018.