The European Commission’s report on GSP raises an important question: has Europe weaponized the concept of human rights, particularly minority rights, so that it can deploy this instrument whenever and against whomever it chooses?

The world now needs to think a little more of the box. Who has given Europe the authority to police the rest of the world according to its own understanding of rights and freedoms? What does Europe’s own record look like? What has it contributed to the world? What role has it played in many of the world’s conflicts? How inclusive are its own societies, particularly toward Muslims and other religious communities? Who has empowered Europe to act simultaneously as prosecutor, witness, judge, and jury in matters concerning the rest of the world?

The European Commission’s latest report on GSP once again repeats the familiar narrative regarding Pakistan. Under the banners of minority rights, religious freedom, and human rights, Pakistan has once again been placed in the dock. It increasingly appears that Muslim-majority countries, particularly Pakistan, have become permanent targets of such reports. Every few years, a new report is published, drawing heavily on the narratives of a handful of NGOs, elevating them into unquestionable global truths, and then using them to demand explanations from Pakistan.

By now, this pattern is well understood. NGOs are established, funded, and assigned specific agendas. Reports are then prepared in line with those agendas, and those very reports become the basis for exerting political and economic pressure on countries like Pakistan.

A fundamental question deserves serious consideration: is Europe’s interpretation of human rights the only legitimate one? Do human beings not live in Asia, Africa, and the Muslim world? Do other civilizations not possess the right to organize their societies according to their own historical experiences, cultural values, and social structures? Must the entire world see through Europe’s eyes, think through Europe’s mind, and measure itself against Europe’s standards? If that is the expectation, then this is not the universalization of human rights; it is the universalization of cultural hegemony.

Those who prosecute Pakistan over minority rights should also look into their own mirror. Although 97 percent of Pakistan’s population is Muslim, the country has 2,189 churches, amounting to one church for every 1,206 Christians. There are 732 Hindu temples, one for every 5,669 Hindus, and 58 gurdwaras, equivalent to one for every 159 Sikhs. In contrast, the United Kingdom has only one mosque for every 2,249 Muslims. Do these figures not raise legitimate questions?

Europe’s own record also deserves scrutiny. France banned conspicuous religious symbols, including the hijab, in public schools in 2004. In 2011, it prohibited the wearing of the face veil in public, and in 2023, it extended restrictions to the abaya in public schools. Belgium, Denmark, Austria, Switzerland, and the Netherlands have also imposed restrictions on face-covering garments. If a........

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