Quetta, October 30, 2026 (Yes Punjab News)
A leading human rights organisation on Friday strongly condemned the 10-year prison sentences imposed on Pakistani human rights lawyers Imaan Zainab Mazari-Hazir and her husband, Hadi Ali Chattha, in a security breach case, describing the verdict as a “clear example of the helplessness of the judiciary in Pakistan, the absence of justice, and a system based on military dominance”.
The Baloch Yakjehti Committee (BYC) said that sentencing the couple to 10 years in prison each was “an attempt to silence the struggle for the defence of human rights and justice”.
The organisation said Imaan Zainab Mazari-Hazir and Hadi Ali Chattha were not merely lawyers but also human rights activists who had consistently raised their voices against atrocities committed against the Baloch, Pashtun and other oppressed communities. It added that the two had played a leading role in the struggle for justice.
In a statement shared on X, the BYC said, “Sentencing Iman Zainab Mazari and Hadi Ali Chatha to ten years in prison each is a clear example of the helplessness of the judiciary in Pakistan, the absence of justice, and a system based on military dominance. It is a reality that those who tirelessly struggle day and night to secure justice for others in a tyrannical state, and who raise their voices for the protection of human rights, eventually find themselves standing in the dock of a court under an oppressive system, forced to face state injustice themselves.”
The committee said the couple had expressed solidarity with families affected by state oppression, including enforced disappearances. It added that they were now facing injustice under the very system against which they had spoken out in defence of the rights of oppressed communities.
The BYC said the couple had been deprived of justice and was being subjected to injustice.
On Thursday, an anti-terrorism court in Islamabad sentenced Imaan Zainab Mazari-Hazir and Hadi Ali Chattha to 10 years in prison each in a case linked to the removal of barricades placed on a road during a cricket match in Islamabad in 2024. The verdict has raised questions about the impartiality of Pakistan’s judicial system.
The court also fined both lawyers PKR 100,000 each under the Anti-Terrorism Act, 1997. It directed that all sentences run concurrently, bringing their total imprisonment to 10 years each.
“The question is: Is raising one’s voice for justice a crime? Is standing with oppressed nations a punishable act? And is the attempt to silence those who defend human rights precisely because they dare to speak out against state oppression? The sentence handed down to Iman Zainab Mazari and Hadi Ali Chatha is not merely the punishment of two individuals; rather, it is an alarming message to all those voices that speak out for the oppressed and resist injustice. When lawyers and human rights activists begin to feel unsafe themselves, it is only natural for questions to arise about the entire justice system,” the BYC said in its post on X.
“However, history bears witness that truth cannot be eradicated through the hardships of imprisonment. The high walls of prisons may temporarily restrict a voice, but they cannot silence forever the voices raised for right and justice. The sentencing of Iman Zainab Mazari and Hadi Ali Chatha poses a critical question to all individuals struggling for justice, freedom of expression, and human rights: Does the freedom to raise one’s voice for the oppressed truly exist in this country?” it added.
The BYC urged human rights organisations, lawyers’ representative bodies, civil society groups and international human rights institutions to take notice of the matter and raise their voices in support of justice.
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