Asma Jilani Jahangir (born January 27 1952 in Lahore) is a Pakistani lawyer and human rights activist. She has been the United Nations Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Religion or Belief since 2004 (first attached to the former Commission on Human Rights now to the Human Rights Council). Previously she served as the UN Special Reporter on Extrajudicial Arbitrary and Summary Executions.Early lifeJahangir father Malik Jilani was a former civil servant who entered politics upon retirement and spent some time in jail and under house arrest for opposing military dictatorships. Jahangir herself became involved at a young age in protests against the military regime as well as opposing her father s detention by then president Benazir Bhutto father Zulfikar Ali Bhutto in 1972 in Pakistan. She completed her BA from Kinnaid College Lahore her law degree in 1978 and her LLB from Punjab University. She also holds an honorary Doctorate from the University of Saint Gallen in Switzerland.WorkShe has spent her career defending the human rights of women religious minorities and children of Pakistan. Jahangir has been and remains a staunch critic of the Hudood ordinance and blasphemy laws of Pakistan put in place as part of General Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq s Islamization program in Pakistan. She is a founding member of the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan and has served as Secretary-General and later Chair of the organization.In 1980 Jahangir and her sister Hina Jilani got together with fellow activists and lawyers to form the first law firm established by women in Pakistan. They also helped form the Women s Action Forum (WAF) that same year. The first WAF demonstration was in 1983 when some 25-50 women took to the streets protesting the Safia Bibi case.Safia a young blind girl had been raped yet ended up in jail on the charge of zina (fornication). We (their law firm) had been given a lot of cases by the advocate general and the moment this demonstration came to light the cases were taken away from us. In 1986 Jahangir and Hina set up AGHS Legal Aid the first free legal aid centre in Pakistan. The AGHS Legal Aid Cell in Lahore also runs a shelter for women called Dastak .In 1982 Jahangir earned the nickname little heroine after leading a protest march in Islamabad against a decision by then-president Zia ul Haq to enforce religious laws and stated Family laws [which are religious laws] give women few rights and that They have to be reformed because Pakistan cannot live in isolation. We cannot remain shackled while other women progress. She is also a proponent of protecting the rights of persecuted religious minorities in Pakistan and speaks out against forced conversions.She is also an active opponent of child labour and capital punishment It would be hypocrisy to defend laws I don t believe in like capital punishment the blasphemy law and laws against women and in favor of child labor.
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