Europe’s human rights principles apparently come with a €732 million exception for Pakistan.

As political repression intensifies in Pakistan, the European Union continues to reward Islamabad with preferential access to its vast single market. Behind the economic benefits lies an increasingly uncomfortable question: How far is Europe prepared to go to defend the human rights it claims to champion?

On October 13, the streets of northwestern Pakistan became a battleground between police and supporters of imprisoned former Prime Minister Imran Khan. Tear gas filled the air, approximately 50 people were arrested, and allegations emerged that security forces had fired live ammunition, claims the authorities denied. The confrontation offered another glimpse of a country where political dissent increasingly collides with the coercive power of the state.

Two days earlier, President Asif Ali Zardari had declared a state of emergency in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, effectively suspending the elected provincial government controlled by Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party. Islamabad justified the extraordinary intervention by citing a growing terrorist threat and the provincial government’s failure to confront it. The opposition condemned the decision as a politically motivated purge designed to eliminate one of the few remaining centers of resistance to the federal government.

Pakistan’s deepening political crisis is hardly an isolated episode. The military’s longstanding influence over civilian institutions has persisted alongside allegations of enforced disappearances, extrajudicial killings, intimidation of journalists, and the systematic suppression of political opposition.

George Orwell’s observation in 1984 that “Power is not a means; it is an end” seems particularly relevant to a political system in which the boundaries between civilian government, military authority, and political coercion have become increasingly difficult to distinguish.

Yet while Pakistan’s democratic institutions face mounting pressure, Islamabad continues to enjoy generous trade privileges from the European Union under the Generalised Scheme of Preferences Plus (GSP+), an arrangement explicitly intended to encourage respect for fundamental rights and good governance.

The financial rewards are considerable.

In 2024 alone, Pakistani exporters benefited from an estimated €732 million in customs-duty exemptions under GSP+, according to the European Commission. Since joining the scheme on January 1, 2014, Pakistan has enjoyed preferential access to the European market for a substantial share of its exports, particularly textiles and clothing.

These advantages were never intended to be unconditional. In exchange, Pakistan committed to implementing 27 international conventions covering human and labor rights, environmental protection, and good governance. For a country whose export economy depends heavily on its textile industry, the arrangement offered an extraordinary commercial opportunity.

But preferential access came with an expectation that economic incentives would encourage meaningful political and institutional reform.

More than a decade later, the results raise troubling questions.

In its July 16 assessment covering the period from 2023 to 2025, the European Commission documented limited progress in Pakistan’s compliance with its international obligations, alongside significant deterioration in several critical areas. Legislative improvements had been introduced, but their practical impact remained uneven, while longstanding concerns about fundamental freedoms persisted.

The contradiction was unmistakable: Pakistan remained the largest beneficiary of GSP+ despite serious shortcomings in fulfilling the commitments that justified its preferential treatment.

In 2024, approximately €7.5 billion in Pakistani exports were eligible for GSP+ benefits, with a preference utilization rate of 95.1%. These figures illustrate the remarkable economic importance of the arrangement and the extent to which Pakistan has integrated its export industries into the European market.

They also expose the central weakness of the EU’s approach. Commercial engagement has flourished, but comparable progress in protecting fundamental rights has proved far more elusive.

The Commission’s assessment raised concerns about enforced disappearances, extrajudicial killings, and inadequate accountability for abuses. It also documented restrictions on freedom of expression, the increasingly troubling implications of cybercrime legislation, and persistent questions about judicial independence.

October’s political upheaval only intensified those concerns. The suspension of an elected provincial government, arrests of opposition figures, and restrictions on communications underscored the fragility of Pakistan’s democratic institutions.

The security challenges confronting Islamabad are nevertheless genuine. Clashes along the Afghan border on October 17 highlighted the dangers posed by militant violence and regional instability. Pakistan faces an extraordinarily difficult security environment, and its government has a legitimate responsibility to protect its population.

But combating terrorism cannot become an unlimited license to suppress political opposition or dismantle constitutional safeguards. The existence of real security threats does not automatically establish the legitimacy of every measure taken in their name.

The issue, then, is not whether Pakistan should benefit from international trade. It is whether the European Union can continue extending preferential treatment while the conditions underpinning that generosity are being so visibly undermined.

Brussels faces a difficult calculation. Pakistan is an important supplier to European consumers, and its garment industry supports a substantial workforce. An abrupt withdrawal of trade preferences could impose economic hardship on workers and families who bear little responsibility for the policies of their government.

There is also the geopolitical dimension. Situated between China, India, Afghanistan, and Iran, Pakistan occupies a strategically important position in a region marked by instability and competing international interests. Maintaining diplomatic and economic engagement with Islamabad serves legitimate European objectives.

These considerations help explain why Brussels has favored engagement over confrontation. They do not necessarily establish that commercial or geopolitical interests dictate European policy, but they make the EU’s reluctance to impose meaningful consequences easier to understand.

The European Union insists that its approach relies on monitoring, dialogue, and the gradual encouragement of reform through economic incentives. The underlying assumption is that preferential market access can produce improvements in governance without resorting to punitive measures.

Yet after more than twelve years, the uncomfortable question remains: At what point does dialogue cease to function as an instrument of pressure and become an excuse for tolerating persistent abuses?

Europe has demonstrated that its trade preferences are not beyond political scrutiny.

In 2020, the EU partially withdrew Cambodia’s preferential market access under the separate Everything But Arms arrangement, citing serious and systematic human rights violations. The decision affected approximately 20% of Cambodia’s exports to the European market.

Pakistan and Cambodia are not legally identical cases, and the circumstances surrounding their respective trade arrangements differ. Nevertheless, the Cambodian precedent establishes an important principle: preferential market access can be withdrawn when the conditions attached to it are systematically violated.

The EU is therefore not confronting a shortage of available instruments. The more difficult question concerns its willingness to use them.

A new European GSP framework is scheduled to take effect on January 1, 2027, strengthening monitoring provisions and providing mechanisms for more rapid withdrawal of preferences in particularly serious circumstances. The reforms create an opportunity for Brussels to demonstrate that its commitments to human rights extend beyond diplomatic declarations.

Whether those reforms produce meaningful consequences will depend less on the language of European legislation than on the political resolve behind its enforcement.

Pakistan’s experience also reflects a broader international dilemma. Across countries as different as Afghanistan, Iran, and Myanmar, authoritarian practices and the concentration of political power have placed fundamental freedoms under sustained pressure. The historical consequences of military rule in countries such as Indonesia offer another reminder of how deeply weakened accountability can shape political institutions and public life.

Western democracies are hardly immune to their own contradictions. Political polarization, discrimination, anti-immigration policies, and the growing influence of far-right movements have complicated their claims to moral leadership. These challenges do not excuse repression elsewhere, but they underscore the importance of applying human rights principles consistently rather than invoking them selectively.

For the European Union, Pakistan presents a particularly revealing test because its economic leverage is substantial, its legal commitments are explicit, and the shortcomings identified by European institutions are already documented.
Brussels cannot indefinitely insist that human rights are central to its trade policy while treating repeated violations as little more than another subject for diplomatic consultation.

Nor would an immediate, indiscriminate withdrawal of preferences necessarily produce the desired outcome. Punishing Pakistan’s workers for the conduct of its political and military leadership would create its own moral contradiction. Any enforcement measures should therefore be proportionate, evidence-based, and attentive to their consequences for vulnerable communities.

But concern for those consequences cannot justify perpetual inaction.

The European Union should openly examine the commercial and strategic considerations shaping its relationship with Islamabad, establish clear benchmarks for measurable improvements, and make explicit the consequences of continued noncompliance. If serious and systematic violations of Pakistan’s international commitments are established under the applicable legal standards, Brussels should be prepared to initiate the procedures for withdrawing trade preferences.

The central question is no longer whether Europe possesses the economic influence to demand greater accountability. It is whether European leaders are prepared to exercise that influence when doing so carries a political or commercial cost.

Human rights commitments mean little when they are enforced only where economic interests are negligible. If the European Union expects other governments to respect the values it proclaims, it must demonstrate that those values are worth defending even when doing so comes at a price.