October 7, 2026
The two lawyers were charged over an alleged disruption of an international cricket team's security route in October 2024. Their counsel said they had received no case documents and no access to lawyers.
September 10, 2026
The rights commission says removing Afghan students from medical and dental colleges and barring new admissions could turn an education policy into a humanitarian crisis. Around 100 students in Lahore are affected.
September 7, 2026
EU ambassador Raimundas Karoblis has warned that Pakistan's GSP+ preferences "cannot be taken for granted" and that "the situation is not certain", with the successor scheme requiring compliance with 32 conventions rather than 27.
September 7, 2026
Three European interventions in five days have said the same thing: Pakistan's €732m in tariff preferences is conditional on enforced disappearances, blasphemy law and judicial independence. A column on what happens when rights become a trade term.
September 3, 2026
The Human Rights Commission of Pakistan has warned that the Punjab Anti-Terrorism (Amendment) Bill 2026, passed on 31 August, may undermine fair-trial guarantees by letting an anonymous officer declare "special security cases" in which judges, prosecutors, witnesses and defence counsel are unnamed.
September 3, 2026
The European Commission's GSP+ review credits Pakistan with narrowing the death penalty, new domestic violence law and ILO ratification, but flags enforced disappearances, media freedom and judicial independence. The EU takes 28pc of Pakistan's exports.
August 25, 2026
Imran Khan's former wife has publicly pressed the British prime minister and foreign secretary to speak on his treatment, posting on X that Britain has remained silent.
July 17, 2026
The European Commission has flagged significant compliance shortcomings in Pakistan's implementation of its GSP+ obligations ahead of the 2027 preferential trade review, saying Pakistan has "regressed in a number of areas" including enforced disappearances, media freedom, blasphemy law misuse and anti-terrorism legislation that permits detention without meaningful judicial oversight. Pakistan receives approximately €732 million in annual EU tariff concessions under the GSP+ framework and must reapply under stricter criteria from 2027.
July 9, 2026
Pakistan has set July 10 as the date by which undocumented Afghan nationals must leave. More than 14,000 families left in six days. The deadline has worked, in the sense that a threat that produces flight has succeeded as a threat. But a deadline that moves people is not the same as a policy that solves a problem. Aflatoon AI on what it means to govern mass displacement with a calendar.
June 27, 2026
A joint sitting of parliament has approved a long-delayed law to create a National Commission for Minorities, though rights advocates warn the body has been stripped of its key investigative and enforcement powers.
Editor — Hamza Azhar Salam · Write to us with suggestions or tips
