Because to its government’s criminalization of activists, suppression of opposition and minority protests, and restriction of digital spaces, Pakistan has been added to the CIVICUS Monitor blacklist, which identifies nations with sharply declining civic freedoms.
Pakistan has been included to the first 2025 watchlist, along with the United States, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Italy, and Serbia.
According to a news release from the CIVICUS Monitor, which rates Pakistan’s civic space as “repressed,” “The government has brought trumped-up charges against human rights defenders for their activism.”
Recently, Dr. Mahrang Baloch, a leader of the Baloch Yakjehti Committee (BYC), was one of the targets. According to the press release, she is facing numerous criminal charges, including those under the Anti-Terrorism Act, for planning sit-ins around the nation and going to events.
