The UNPO welcomes a new statement issued on 22 April by six UN Special Rapporteurs and experts raising alarm over the continued pattern of abduction and forced religious conversion through marriage targeting women and girls from religious minority communities in Pakistan.
The statement highlights the systemic nature of these abuses, which target Hindu and Christian girls, particularly in Sindh province. This latest warning builds on a series of earlier UN communications and press releases issued in October 2022, January 2023, and April 2024, underscoring that the crisis is longstanding and remains unresolved.
According to the experts, data from 2025 shows that 75% of women and girls subjected to forced conversion through marriage were Hindu and 25% Christian. Nearly 80% of documented cases occurred in Sindh, predominantly involving girls between 14 and 18 years old, though some were even younger. The experts further noted that poverty, marginalisation, and discrimination heighten vulnerability, exposing victims to physical and sexual abuse, exploitation, social stigma, and severe psychological trauma.
The UNPO has consistently raised concerns over this pattern, including in its recent submission to the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights in response to the call for input on combating intolerance based on religion or belief. Sindhi Hindu and Christian girls have reportedly been abducted, held against their will, raped, coerced into providing conversion testimonies, and married to their abductors, often through processes validated by complicit clerics or accepted without scrutiny by state institutions. The Human Rights Commission of Pakistan has estimated that more than twenty girls are subjected to such abuse each month, with actual numbers likely far higher due to barriers to reporting.
As previously highlighted by UN experts, impunity remains a central driver of these violations. Law enforcement authorities have frequently dismissed complaints lodged by victims’ families, failed to properly verify victims’ ages, and in some instances facilitated abuses they are mandated to prevent. Courts have also repeatedly accepted dubious marriage and conversion documentation, even where contradicted by official records.
The widespread and recurring nature of these abuses demonstrates not isolated incidents, but entrenched discrimination against minority women and girls, driven by impunity, patriarchal norms, and inadequate state protection.
For the UNPO, these violations must also be understood as attacks on the collective rights and self-determination of unrepresented peoples. When girls from unrepresented communities are targeted through coercive conversion and marriage, these acts undermine not only individual autonomy, but also the cultural survival, security, and agency of the communities to which they belong. Protecting freedom of religion or belief is inseparable from protecting the right of peoples to preserve their identity and determine their own future.
The UNPO joins the UN experts in calling on Pakistan to:
- Raise the minimum age of marriage to 18 in all provinces and territories without exception;
- Criminalise forced religious conversion as a distinct offence;
- Enforce laws relating to human trafficking and sexual violence;
- Ensure prompt, impartial investigations into all allegations and bring perpetrators to justice;
- Provide accessible protection and support services, including shelters, legal aid, psychosocial support, and reintegration programmes for survivors;
- Address the root causes of forced conversion through marriage, including gender inequality, discrimination against religious minorities, and entrenched impunity.
