Pakistan rejected on Thursday the 2023 country report on human rights practices issued by the US State Department, describing its contents as “unfair, based on inaccurate information and completely divorced from the ground reality”.

In a statement, Foreign Office spokesperson Mumtaz Zahra Bloch claimed that the US State Department’s annual exercises of preparing such reports lacked objectivity and remained inherently flawed in their methodology.

In its 100-page report, the State Department said that the human rights situation in Pakistan continues to be bleak and has not shown any improvement in the last year.

“The government rarely took credible steps to identify and punish officials who may have committed human rights abuses,” the report said.

The FO spokesperson claimed that the report clearly demonstrated the double standards thus undermining the international human rights discourse.

“These reports use a domestic social lens to judge human rights in other countries in a politically biased manner. This year’s report is once again conspicuous by its lack of objectivity and politicization of the international human rights agenda,” she added.

She said it was deeply concerning that a report purported to highlight human rights situations around the world “ignored or downplayed” the most urgent hotspots of gross human rights violations such as in Gaza and Indian Illegally Occupied Jammu & Kashmir.

“Only a politically motivated report can ignore the alarming situation in Gaza, the weaponization of humanitarian assistance and the massacre of over 33,000 civilians. Silence of the United States on the continuing genocide in Gaza runs counter to the stated objectives behind the so-called country reports on human rights,” she said.

The spokesperson reiterated that Pakistan remained steadfast in its commitment to strengthen its own human rights framework, constructively engage to promote international human rights agenda and uphold fairness and objectivity in the international human rights discourse.

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“If the US must engage in this exercise, then we expect the US State Department to at least exercise due diligence when conducting the assessment of complex issues, demonstrate objectivity, impartiality, and responsibility in finalizing such reports.”

She said the US should demonstrate the “requisite moral courage” to speak the truth about all situations and play a constructive role in supporting international efforts to bring an end to atrocities in the most urgent hotpots of gross human rights violations.