European officials urged the suspension of Pakistan’s GSP+ trade benefits, citing worsening human rights conditions. Inna Chefranova stressed values must be upheld for trade, while MEP Barbara Bonte accused Pakistan of failing commitments on rights and religious freedom, raising concerns over madrassa growth fueling extremism.
00:00Barbara, you have very serious consequences of the GSP Plus status which Pakistan is enjoying.
00:07So, what issues do you want to raise at the UN at this event?
00:12Yeah, we spoke about the GSP Plus programme, so it's a form of trade preferences
00:19that the European Union has granted to Pakistan.
00:24So, Pakistan has to fulfill a lot of commitments before they could receive it.
00:34For example, they have to respect human rights, they have to respect freedom of religion.
00:40But in fact, all those conditions are not be done by Pakistan, so they don't fulfill those commitments.
00:49And still, they are receiving trade preferences and also, for example, money also for education in Pakistan.
00:57So, yeah, it's not fulfilled and still they receive a lot of taxpayers' money from the European Union and we want to stop this.
01:04You called for the suspension of GSP Plus status to Pakistan.
01:08Yes.
01:09It's promotion to religious extremism, you know, and the issues of the money to promote religious extremism through Madrasat.
01:15So far, how serious is that issue?
01:17Yeah, that's a very serious issue because the Madrasas have come from a few hundred to more than 30,000 in Pakistan.
01:25And it's still the top of the iceberg, I think, because we can't see the big thing about it.
01:32But it's a serious issue.
01:33It also has a lot of consequences because you have, for example, leaders of the Taliban who have been recruited there.
01:41Also extremists who do terror attacks in Europe, in the West come from those schools.
01:48So it's a very serious concern for Pakistan, but also for Europe and for the West.
01:54Since you are a member of the European Parliament, are you going to be raising this issue in the Parliament?
02:00Yes, so this issue has already been twice on the agenda of the plenary in the European Parliament.
02:07It's twice, so they approved to suspend the GSP Plus status, but still the European Commission is refusing it.
02:14So I will raise it at the agenda in November, so I will put it on the agenda again to put awareness for this very serious matter.
02:26And yeah, I hope this time the European Commission will listen to us.
02:30It's a very important event that happened, you know, about the GSP Plus status, which Pakistan has been enjoying for many years.
02:38And the money has been misused on different things, you know, especially the persecution of the minorities and the growth of madrasas and religious extremism going on.
02:51So how serious is this issue?
02:53This issue is very serious.
02:55It has been spotted already by many human rights defenders.
02:59Even twice, as you heard in the conference, the issue has been raised in the European Parliament.
03:05So there were two resolutions in 2014.
03:07Even before it started, there was a resolution to force Pakistan to comply with conventions because, I mean, people saw where this was going.
03:15And then in 2021, based on blasphemy cases, there was another call to suspend.
03:21Again, we are not calling to stop it, as you heard in the conference.
03:25We are calling to suspend it until Pakistan meets criteria of GSP Plus.
03:31And this is a value-based mechanism.
03:33It's values.
03:34So Pakistan has to implement values in exchange for money, for trade benefits.
03:39Trade benefits are huge.
03:41Pakistan is the most important country in that scheme because of the size of Pakistan, because it's a nuclear power.
03:47And as Jan Fiegel in the film said, if there is one GSP that should be exemplary, it is Pakistan GSP Plus.
03:55But this is not happening.
03:57And we are trying to understand why.
03:59Because there are lots of discussions.
04:01We had these discussions for 10 years.
04:03So there were motions, resolutions in the parliament.
04:06Then nothing happened.
04:07It is just getting extended and extended and extended.
04:09And the situation with human rights is worsening.
04:13So two years ago, European Commission has extended it for another five years.
04:19Although there were conferences, people, human rights activists, they raised this issue.
04:24There were demonstrations in Brussels about this.
04:26So this time, because we know that this summer there was a review,
04:29I think the results of this review will be published in October or November this year.
04:34So we are looking forward to those results.
04:37And so we decided to run this campaign.
04:40So we produced this documentary based on interview with senior EU officials,
04:46who are themselves telling that this is wrong, what is going on.
04:49And they are responsible for the victim.
04:51So European Commission is also responsible because it adopts this lax attitude.
04:58And on the other hand, if Pakistan, you know, sees the European Commission just follow its own rules,
05:05because those rules are described as a contract, as I said.
05:08It was signed by Pakistan.
05:09Then why Pakistan should should follow rules?
05:12It's a setting a very bad example.
05:14And I think it's even encouraging bad behavior.
05:18So with this campaign, we produced documentary.
05:21We actually premiered it in the Council of Europe in Strasbourg two days ago,
05:26in front of a group of national members of Parliament.
05:33It was very good, very interactive section and event.
05:38And it seems that people in the countries, European countries and outside of the EU countries,
05:43they even know where.
05:44So we had a very good interactive session.
05:47The people were asking, is this true?
05:49What other mechanisms are there?
05:51They waste money in this way.
05:53And while encouraging this kind of horrific, horrific human rights abuses.
05:59And so we also produced a brochure, which explains in the popular terms, the mechanism, the abuses, the breach.
06:10It also outlines very clear mechanism, what European Commission should do to stop.
06:16And again, I repeat, we are not calling to completely suspend or to stop it.
06:21We are calling to suspend it temporarily until Pakistan meets its obligations.
06:26Okay.
06:27And we produced also white paper, which is based on the European Commission own documents.
06:32So European Commission had contracts.
06:34So we explained using which articles they could suspend it temporarily, especially that there were also precedents regarding suspension.
06:43So Myanmar is a case in point, Belarus and some other countries.
06:48So it's possible.
06:49It's possible.
06:50And on top of that, European Commission has suspended ethanol trade this summer.
06:56That wasn't based on the human rights, but that was because ethanol producers in Europe asked them.
07:03They said that we are facing unfair competition from Pakistan.
07:06So can we stop?
07:07Then emissions stopped.
07:08But basically only based on economic grounds.
07:11Do you believe that, you know, temporarily suspension of GSP plus status will make any impact in the Pakistani policies?
07:19I think we need to make a very strong signal to Pakistan.
07:24You know, we've been to many events where GSP plus was discussed, where they were organized by European external action services.
07:32So their experience when they go to Pakistan to discuss with officials, sometimes they're even ignored.
07:38You know, but if you take money, maybe they will not be ignored because UN has conventions.
07:45ILO International Labour Organization has this convention, but it doesn't have the money mechanism.
07:49It doesn't have anything to take from Pakistan.
07:51While European Commission granted to Pakistan and it can shake.
07:55So that's the best mechanism to force.
07:57Okay, we will see.
07:58We very much hope this is why we are doing this.
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