A Pakistani human rights council condemns the disruption of the Internet as the opposition launches an election campaign Hurriyat News

The Human Rights Council of Pakistan condemned the disruption of internet and social media services across the country as the opposition launched an election campaign. He described it as a “violation of international law.”

“In the context of elections, all political parties must have the fundamental right to freedom of expression. It is the responsibility of the government of Pakistan to uphold fundamental rights,” the council said on the X platform.

Internet services and social media were disrupted throughout Pakistan on Sunday, at a time when the imprisoned former prime minister’s party was preparing Imran Khan To launch a massive online campaign ahead of the elections scheduled for next month.

The nomination of Khan and most of his party leaders was rejected.Insaf movement“For the elections scheduled for February 8th.

Khan, who has been imprisoned since last August, confirms that the army has been collaborating for years with the families that have ruled Pakistan for years to crush his popular movement and prevent him from running for elections.

His party was expected to launch a huge national and international fundraising campaign on Sunday evening during which it would present its program, but the Internet service was cut off in the afternoon.

Netblocks, an organization that monitors cybersecurity and internet governance, said: “What happened is similar to previous shutdowns of social media sites, all of which were imposed during rallies of opposition parties or speeches by opposition leader Imran Khan.”

Alp Tucker, director of NetBlocks, said that Internet outages affected network providers throughout the country.

Challenge campaign

Khan, 71, was ousted from power last year after a dispute with Pakistan’s powerful military leaders, who supported him to come to power in 2018.

Upon his transition to the opposition, Khan waged an unprecedented campaign of defiance against the military establishment that had directly ruled the country for much of its history.

Khan accused the military leaders of colluding with the United States to remove him from power through a vote of no confidence, and of orchestrating an assassination attempt against him.

After the unrest that followed his arrest last May, his party was subjected to a severe repression campaign that resulted in its leaders being imprisoned or forced to leave the party.

The Supreme Court is scheduled to issue a ruling this week on the exclusion Nawaz Sharif About elections for life after he served as Prime Minister 3 times. Sharif returned from exile earlier this year to launch a political campaign, and has the potential to win if he is allowed to run.