South Asia Collective Online Bulletin #7

The South Asia Collective Online Bulletin #3

Greetings from the South Asia Collective! We are a group of human rights activists and organisations from across South Asia. We’ve been working since 2015 to document the condition of the region’s minorities, and to help develop capacity among grassroots-level organisations focused on minority rights and the freedom of religion or belief (FoRB).

This is the seventh edition of our Online Bulletin, where we provide an overview of significant minority-related news developments that have transpired in the region. since during the third quarter of 2021 (1st July to 30th September). Events till then were covered in previous editions of our Bulletin.

In this edition, we cover the cataclysmic implications of the Taliban’s recent takeover of Afghanistan. We also look at recent incidents of state and non-state targeting of the Ahmadiyya in Pakistan; Christians in India and Pakistan; Dalits in India and Nepal; Hindus in Bangladesh and Pakistan; Muslims in India and Sri Lanka; Tamils in Sri Lanka; and Shia Muslims in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

The SAC Online Bulletin is put together by researchers from Afghanistan, Bangladesh, India, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka. It aims to be an informative update on the situation of minorities and minority rights in South Asia. Click the button below to subscribe to future editions.

The latest edition of SAC’s flagship annual report, the South Asia State of Minorities Report, 2021, will be released next month. The report focuses on the theme ‘anti-minority hate speech and incitement’, and will be available for free download. Click here to subscribe to receive it in your inbox once it is released.

The South Asia State of Minorities Report 2021:

Hate Speech Against Minorities

(click here to subscribe to receive the report in your inbox)

The report will contain chapters from Afghanistan, Bangladesh, India, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka, in addition to regional-level analysis and a yearly round-up of major, minority-related developments in each country.
SAC was a co-organiser, together with the Tom Lantos Institute among other organisations, of the UN Special Rapporteur on Minority Issues-led Asia-Pacific Regional Forum on conflict prevention and the protection of the human rights, held on 7th-8th September, 2021. Several SAC-sponsored experts spoke at the event. The recommendations of the Regional Forum are meant to contribute to the United Nations Forum on Minority Issues (December 2021) and eventually to the report of the SR on Minority Issues to the Human Rights Council on the theme of Conflict Prevention and Minorities, in 2022.

Full recordings of the two-day event are available here: Day 1 | Day 2
SAC runs an emergency assistance fund for human rights defenders working to advance FoRB in South Asia. The fund remains active, and applications can be made at any time.

In the third quarter of 2021, South Asia’s various minority groups continued to face violent targeting and discrimination from non-state actors and, in many cases, from state actors. And across all countries, this has mostly been followed by state failures to hold perpetrators to account and uphold the rule of law.

In Afghanistan, the Taliban Islamic fundamentalist group toppled the democratic government and re-established the country as an Islamic emirate, upending the lives of women, ethnic and religious minorities. In Bangladesh, the Hindu community faced the country’s worst wave of communal violence in years. India, Christians and Dalits, and particularly Muslims, faced both state targeting and vigilante violence, including a burgeoning trend of livelihoods coming under attack. In Nepal, Dalits continue to face violence and social discrimination. In Pakistan, Christians, Hindus, Shias and the Ahmadiyya faced violent attacks. And in Sri Lanka, amid a general erosion of freedoms against the backdrop of the COVID-19 pandemic, Tamils and Muslims continued to face state targeting.

For more detailed reporting of these and many more developments, click the button below.