POSTED BY ANEEZA ALVI

This decree, also known as "ordinance" serves as amendment of the existing criminal law, allowing some 1,300 women, imprisoned for adultery and other minor crimes, to be freed. Moreover, those who have been charged under the Islamic Hudood Laws, introduced by the controversial former Pakistani dictator General Zia-ul-Haq in 1979, will also benefit from this new decree. Some of the provisions of the Islamic Hudood Laws require that women who file complaints of rape and other sexual assaults must actually provide four eye witnesses to testify for them, otherwise their complaints are not taken into consideration.

Human rights groups and other opposition parties, which include former Pakistani Prime Minister's Benazir Bhutto's Pakistan People Party, have already stated that these series of laws must be revoked and brand new laws be debated and chosen by the Parliament