HUDOOD AMENDMENTS MOVED TO COMMITTEE AS ASSEMBLY

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 03 ISLAMABAD 016956 SIPDIS SIPDIS E.O. 12958: DECL: 08/27/2016 TAGS: PK PGOV KWMN KDEM PHUM SUBJECT: HUDOOD AMENDMENTS MOVED TO COMMITTEE AS ASSEMBLY CONSIDERS NO CONFIDENCE MOTION REF: A. ISLAMABAD 15630 ¶B. ISLAMABAD 14095 ¶C. ISLAMABAD 6800 ¶D. GRENCIK-SACKS EMAIL 08/24/2006 ¶E. LAHORE - SEPTEL Classified By: CDA Peter W. Bodde, Reasons 1.4 (b) and (d) ¶1. (C) Summary and Introduction: After a initial failure to convene a quorum on August 18, the Pakistan Muslim League-led (PML) government of Prime Minster Shaukat Aziz introduced a bill during the August 21 National Assembly session proposing amendments to the Hudood Ordinance, the draconian 1979 presidential order promulgated by General Zia-ul-Haq delineating the elements and punishment for offenses such as rape, adultery and perjury. Entitled the "Criminal Law Amendment (Protection of Women) Act, 2006", the bill is a revised version of the government's initial draft, but one that retains critical provisions that, inter alia, distinguish rape from adultery, establish the concept of statutory rape and remove the restriction requiring the testimony of "four male Muslim witnesses" to sustain a rape charge. (Note: Post has forward the full texts of both government's original draft and the bill as introduced to SCA/PB. End note.) ¶2. (C) Thanks to procedural connivance between the PML and opposition Pakistan People's Party (PPP),the Hudood bill was swiftly moved off the floor to a special multi-party committee, freeing the way for Parliamentary debate on the opposition's no confidence motion against Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz (Ref C). Although some women's/human rights activists decry the proposed amendments as falling far short of the mark, post believes that passage of the bill as it now stands would mark a significant step forward for Pakistani women, as well as for President Musharraf's vision of Enlightened Moderation. End summary and introduction. Pressure to Backslide -------------- ¶3. (C) Little more than two weeks ago, Attorney General Makhdoom Amin Khan (the bill's principal drafter) shared with poloffs serious reservations regarding the amendment's prospects (Ref A),noting that several Cabinet member and PML party leaders were advocating amendments that would severely weaken the carefully crafted bill. Throughout the second week of August, local media carried stories detailing calls from both government politicians and opposition Islamist parties to walk back the amendments. By mid-August, the headlines had shifted to President Musharraf's personal intervention, first with Cabinet members and then with PML parliamentary managers, admonishing them to move the bill forward smartly with minimal compromise. Parliamentary Theater -------------- ¶4. (C) Political drama of the highest order followed the government's introduction of the amendments on August 21. As expected, members from the opposition Islamist Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal (MMA) virulently attacked the bill as "un-Islamic," literally tearing their copies of the bill into small pieces they flung to the floor. As the debate raged, Information Minister Durrani declared to the Assembly (and television cameras) that by shredding copies of the bill -- papers which contained language with direct quotes from holy texts -- the MMA members had "desecrated" the Quran. As shamed MMA (and grandstanding PML) members scrambled to retrieve the defiled scraps of paper from the Assembly floor, the PPP moved to establish a special committee to review the bill. Embarrassed by the unforeseen fallout from the bill-shredding incident, even the MMA did not object to moving the bill from the floor to the committee. ¶5. (C) In a conversation immediately following the August 21 session, Chairman of the National Reconstruction Bureau(PML) Daniyal Aziz told poloffs that the tactic of moving the bill to a special Assembly committee required ISLAMABAD 00016956 002 OF 003 close cooperation between government and PPP parliamentary leaders. According to Aziz, the committee's mandate is severely limited, restricted to the sole question of whether any of the bill's provisions contravene the Quran. Moving the bill to the committee not only prevented extended debate on the floor by MMA opponents, but also pens in the MMA from proposing broad revisions the bill's language. Confident that the bill has been drafted in strict conformance with the Quran, Aziz predicted that the MMA efforts to attack the text would quickly run out of steam. (Note: Other contacts have told post that the committee's mandate is not restricted, but that there is little chance that the bill will emerge from the committee with any significant revisions. End note.) ¶6. (C) Although publicly characterizing the government's proposed Hudood bill as "too little, too late" and decrying the government's timing as a deliberate attempt to split the opposition in advance of a no confidence motion, PPP leaders such as Information Secretary Sherry Rehman and Aitzaz Ahsen are working with the PML to advance a full-strength bill. Establishing a special committee nicely served PPP purposes, as moving the Hudood amendments off the floor allowed opposition parties to proceed with their long-discussed plan to present a no confidence motion against the government on August 23. As the no confidence motion proceeds toward an expected August 29 vote, the special committee has concurrently begun its work, although not without attendant theatrics: the PPP boycotted the committee's initial meeting in protest over the government's initiative to consult the MMA on the bill outside the Assembly and demanded that Religious Affairs Minister Ejaz-ul-Haq (son of Hudood progenitor General Zia-ul-Haq) be replaced as committee chairperson. (Note: The Assembly speaker granted the latter demand, appointing PML party whip as the committee chair. End note.) Key Amendments -------------- ¶7. (U) A "Statement of Objects and Reasons" appended to the bill concisely presents the case for dramatic amendment to the Hudood Ordinance, stating directly that "the object of this bill is to bring the laws relating to zina (sex outside of marriage) and qazf (perjury),in particular, in conformity with the stated objectives of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan and...in particular to provide relief and protection to women against misuse and abuse of law." The bill distinguishes between offenses and punishments mentioned in the Quran and Sunnah (which are sacrosanct and cannot be revised),such as zina and qazf, but addresses all offenses not defined in these holy texts as "ta'zir" offenses that are the subject of state legislation). Many of the offenses, procedures and penalties in the current Hudood Ordinance, the Statement observes, are merely ta'zir and therefore amenable to revision as the State determines. The bill moves numerous "ta'zir" provisions in the current Hudood Ordinance to the Pakistan Penal Code. ¶8. (U) The current Hudood Ordinance has led to the conflation of zina (sex outside of marriage) with zina-bil-jabr (rape),subjecting both to the same kinds of proof and punishment: women who have been raped, but could not produce four adult male Muslim witness to corroborate the complaint would be automatically charged with, found guilty of and punished for zina. The government's amendment severs this connection, moving the crime of rape to the criminal code, allowing the introduction of forensic evidence and protecting a raped woman from having her complaint used against her as an admission of non-marital sexual intercourse. The amendments introduce the concept of statutory rape, denying defendant's the right to claim consent as a defense if the woman is under 16 years of age. Noting that the courts are often reluctant to find a defendant guilty in cases of gang rape because the current Hudood ordinance requires a penalty of death, the amendment adds the life imprisonment as a sentencing option. ¶9. (C) Under the current Hudood Ordinance, women whose marriage or divorce has not been properly registered have ISLAMABAD 00016956 003 OF 003 been prevented from using these unions as a defense to a zina charges. As many marriages and divorces in Pakistan are not registered, the amendment removes the requirement that a woman charged with adultery must prove that she had a "valid" marriage or divorce. The amendments would codify in law earlier procedural orders that shift authority to bring a charge of adultery from the police (widely believed to act complicity with vengeful husbands) to the courts. The amendment shifts the risk of a zina charge from the woman to the accuser: a complainant alleging zina must present four adult eyewitnesses to corroborate the accusation. If the court finds the charge to be unsubstantiated, the accuser is by definition considered guilty of bearing false witness, the punishment for which is eighty lashes. In the view of the bill's drafter, Attorney General Khan, this shift in the evidentiary and legal burden in zina cases precludes abusive husbands from persecuting their wives with legal vendettas. Comment -------------- ¶10. (C) So far, public reaction to the government's bill is playing according to script. With unremarkable predictability, the MMA and its Islamist supporters have initiated a loud campaign labeling the proposed Hudood Ordinance mendments as un-Islamic -- an accusation they hope will rouse their followers to a mass demonstration of resistance, but which has thus far fallen short. On the other side of the spectrum, some women's and human rights activists maintain a maximalist position, excoriating President Musharraf for waiting seven years to put forward the amendments and declaring that nothing less than full repeal of Zia's Hudood Ordinance will be acceptable. ¶11. (C) After the downbeat assessment of the Attorney General on August 3 and subsequent rumors of revisions to appease Musharraf's more conservative allies (Ref B),poloffs were relieved to find that the bill as introduced to the Assembly retained the most significant amendments proposed in the government's original draft. If adopted in its present form, the resulting statutory framework would significantly enhance the legal protections available to Pakistani women. POL's contacts in European embassies agree that the proposed amendments represent a dramatic step forward. ¶12. (C) National Security Advisor Tariq Aziz, tasked by President Musharraf to coordinate the political strategy for the amendments (Ref A),told Charge d'Affaires on August 26 that he expects the special committee to report the bill back to the Assembly in early September, following the vote on the no confidence motion. Aziz and PML parliamentary leaders intend to see the bill successfully through an Assembly vote before Musharraf's September 9th departure to attended the NAM Summit and UNGA, believing that passage by one house will sufficiently insulate the President from criticism by women's rights activists during his visit to the U.S. BODDE