Federal Minister for Human Rights Dr. shireen M Mazari said that it is state's responsibility to protect the rights of every citizen particularly the rights of women, children and minorities. She said that incumbent Government is determined to ensure the human rights and all utmost efforts are carried out in this regard. She emphasised that as a nation responsibility also lies with us and we need to change our mindset to safeguard the human rights especially the rights of women. She asserted that we need to acknowledge and consider the status and role of women in society. She was addressing the Seminar on Living with Dignity: Post Shelter Integration of Women Survivors of Violence organized by Rozan in collaboration with National Commission on the Status of Women here in Islamabad on Tuesday. The purpose of the seminar was to promote evidence base advocacy dialogue and to share finding from a qualitative research study, titled “Against all odds: Post shelter lives of women survivors of violence” to fill the gap in knowledge by investigating the post-shelter trajectories of women survivors of violence. Shireen Mazari while giving the key note speech at the seminar welcomed civil society support including for bringing in field experience of working with the shelter and informing policies and programming. She highlighted that Ministry is also going to put more emphasis on securing inheritance rights for women so as to ensure economic empowerment. She shared that Ministry of Human Rights Ministry along with the law ministry has formalized distress and detention fund and it will be available for use by the public. She also emphasized on the role of helpline running under Human Rights Ministry in playing its role in addressing violence against women. She recommended that we need to rethink our approach towards violence against women and emphasised on protection with dignity. She emphasized on the importance of introducing innovative approaches for skill building in the government run shelters homes. She shared that government is looking at public private partnerships to bring innovative approaches to shelters so as to support economic independence of women survivors. She welcomed the regularity procedures recommendation for shelters and their proper implementation by the participants for the Ministry. Dr Mazari said The Ministry of Human Rights is working with Ministry of Law to develop a systematic structure for provision of probono legal services and assistance to vulnerable especially women. Dr Mazari said we are bringing new law to protect the women’s right to inheritance, we are working with the law ministry and it will be tabled in parliament soon. She said we are focused to empower the women protect their rights and bringing them in mainstream. She said we have redrafted bill to protect the rights of persons with disabilities, bill has been referred it to the relevant standing committee. We need to have overall holistic approach to implement the existing laws. Shireen Mazari said, we are taking concrete measures not only to implement prevailing laws, but also to introduce new legislation besides awareness raising campaigns to change the mindset of the society including motivation to ensure documentation through registration of births and marriages. She said that they were focused on to protect rights of citizen especially the deprived section of the society particularly the rights of children and women. Human Rights Ministry also running the women shelter adding that steps are being taken to ensure the provision of facilities to the women at the centre. She further said that government making efforts to improve human rights situation, besides concrete measures to educate women. In this regard, government has already started awareness drive regarding the women's right to inheritance adding that another drive to protect child abuse is also running. We are committed to safeguard the rights of our citizens especially the rights of women. The seminar was attended by distinguished guest including Her Excellency Ms Margaret Adamson Australian High Commissioner to Pakistan, Chairperson Punjab Commission on the Status of Women, Ms. Hina Jillani. Ms. Khawar Mumtaz Chairperson National Commission on the Status of women welcomed Rozan’s initiative to fill the knowledge gap about women’s experience of life after leaving shelters that provided temporary succour in times of distress. The findings of study were presented by Dr Maria Rashid, Rozan Advisor. The study put forth important recommendations for the government’s consideration. *****
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