Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi on Thursday said to Special Envoy of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) for Jammu and Kashmir, Ambassador Yousef Aldobeay, that India’s objective is to maintain its illegitimate control over India-occupied Jammu and Kashmir.
Both the officials discussed the ongoing crisis in occupied Jammu and Kashmir, as the foreign minister apprised the envoy of India taking steps to change the demographic ratio in the region by evicting locals.
Qureshi said, “Illegal measures taken by India in India-occupied Jammu and Kashmir are a blatant violation of UN resolutions and international law.” He said the Indian government is “losing the battle of hearts and minds” in occupied Kashmir. “Oppressed Kashmiris are facing a double lockdown due to COVID-19 pandemic,” Qureshi said, adding that “extrajudicial killings of innocent people, arbitrary arrests, rape of women, coercion have become a daily routine.”
The foreign minister highlighted that people living in occupied Jammu and Kashmir are suffering irreparable economic loss due to unilateral measures taken by India.
Qureshi recalled that on the occasion of the 76th session of the General Assembly, during his visit to New York, he drew special attention towards the serious and systematic human rights violations in occupied Jammu and Kashmir and the negative role of India in the region.
“The dossier issued by the Government of Pakistan on September 12, 2021, contains full details of the war crimes committed by the Indian occupying forces,” he added.
The minister emphasised that a solution to the dispute is important for regional peace and stability. “The unilateral and illegal Indian action of August 5, 2019, can neither change the fact nor can it end the inalienable right of the Kashmiri people to self-determination enshrined in relevant UN Security Council resolutions,” he emphasised.
Qureshi said that Indian Occupation forces had killed over 96,000 Kashmiris and raped over 11,250 women and girls since 1989. “Since 1989, the Indian occupation forces have killed more than 96,000 Kashmiris, widowed around 23,000 women, and raped over 11250 women and girls,” he said. He said there was a ‘double lockdown’ in IIOJK as people had been facing lack of access to hospitals, medicines including lifesaving drugs and critical supplies including oxygen kits and ventilators. He highlighted the fact that the Indian Occupied Jammu and Kashmir was the most militarized zone in the world as over 900,000 troops were deployed in the area and innocent Kashmiris were living under an inhuman military siege.
The foreign minister told the delegation that “there is a ratio of eight Indian soldiers against one unarmed Kashmiri.” Apprising the delegation of the grave human rights and humanitarian situation in IIOJK, Qureshi said that the desperation of the RSS-BJP dispensation ruling India to control the indigenous Kashmiri movement had completely run aground. He added that India’s attempts to mislead the international community and portray a false sense of ‘normalcy’ had also abjectly failed. The foreign minister said that the illegal and unilateral actions of India since August 5, 2019 were meant to disenfranchise the Kashmiris and alter the demographic structure of the IIOJK from Muslim majority into a Hindu dominated territory. He stated that those illegal actions were in clear violation of the relevant UN Security Council Resolutions and international law, including the 4th Geneva Convention.
