Faisalabad: January 5, 2011. (PCP) On 2nd January 2011, Association of Women for Awareness and Motivation (AWAM) in collaboration with Agency for Sustainable Development (ASDP), District Focal Group and Liaison for Enforcement of Human Rights (LEHR) staged a peace rally from District Council to Kutchery Bazar in Faisalabad to mark the world day of peace. The purpose of the protest rally was to raise collective voice against poverty, inflation, terrorism, extremism, corruption, political confrontation and human rights violations. This rally was joined by large number of people from different walks of life including representatives from students’, labourers’ and human rights organizations namely; AWAM, ASDP, PHD, LEHR, DOST, JWO, WPP, NSF, CARE, NCJP and EDEN. At this juncture, Naseem Anthony (Executive Secretary-AWAM), Nazia Sardar, Arif Ayaz, Arshad Aziz, Aslam Wafa, Amna Bano, Julia Mehboob, Rana Imran and Abdul Rehman Ansari shared their views on current situation of peace and human rights in Pakistan. The speakers said, “Since Pakistan is indulged in different crises, therefore political parties must avoid criticism and confrontation with political rivals, and must focus their attention on common agenda of providing relief to the general public by devising better people friendly policies in all fields, by controlling inflation and price hike, by securing the lives and properties of the public, and by overcoming the energy and gas cuts.” The participants of the rally were carrying placards in support of peace, harmony, social justice, gender equality, equal human rights, sectarian and religious tolerance, and in opposition to target killing, suicide attacks, religious intolerance and gender based discrimination. They were also enchanting slogans against inflation, corruption, load shedding of energy and gas, attacks on religious sites, injustice, discrimination and violence against women, and reformed general sales tax (RGST). At this juncture, the participants demanded that: Government must take affirmative actions for ending all forms of discrimination and violence, for respect of human rights and democratic principles, for removing class division and corruption, for imposing tax on privileged groups and for curbing target killings and extremism.