Pakistan: Ahmadis say they are being denied flood relief

“We were denied food items at first and then told to vacate a school last month. I’ve left my five children and wife at Rabwah and am now fetching other relatives.” [Farooq Ahmad]

Ahmadiyya Times | News Watch | Int'l Desk
Source / Credit: UCANEWS | August 20, 2010
By ucanews.com reporter | Rabwah

Pakistan’s Ahmadi community says many of its flood-affected members are being denied relief supplies, shelter and even rescue.

Despite the ongoing disaster, discrimination against the Muslim minority is still continuing, it says.

Some 200 Ahmadis are presently sheltering at the Ahmadi community headquarters in Rabwah, central Punjab province, after authorities asked them to vacate government buildings.

The community is working “independently” to provide food at Dar-ul-Ziafat, a free open-to-all restaurant and guesthouse, said spokesman Saleem-ud-Din.


“More than 2,500 community members have been displaced across the country by the floods; most of them are with relatives,” he said.

“Rescuers refused to help Ahmadis in a Punjab village after warning them of approaching floodwaters.”

Another Ahmadi man also cited discrimination by Muslim survivors in displacement camps.

“We were denied food items at first and then told to vacate a school last month. I’ve left my five children and wife at Rabwah and am now fetching other relatives,” Farooq Ahmad, said.

Many Muslims regard the Ahmadis as a heretical Islamic sect.

The Pakistan government declared them non-Muslims in 1974.

Meanwhile, two Ahmadis, one of them a doctor, were murdered this week in Sindh province where water levels in and around the Indus River are still rising.

”It is a pity that such incidents are happening as the country experiences its worst flooding,” said an Aug. 19 Ahmadi press statement condemning the killings.

Despite the struggle in getting relief to survivors, “people are still using religion as an excuse for sectarian violence and religious discrimination,” it said.



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