Srinagar, August 13, 2018 (PPI-OT): In occupied Kashmir, the joint resistance leadership (JRL) comprising Syed Ali Gilani, Mirwaiz Umar Farooq and Muhammad Yasin Malik has said the ongoing spree of arrests and nocturnal raids are most undemocratic. The JRL leaders in a joint statement issued in Srinagar said that from southern districts of Kashmir to northern districts and central Kashmir, a spree of arrests is going on unabated and thousands of young and old are being put behind bars and tortured physically and mentally.
They said that some months back, the DG of police issued a statement and urged upon warring parties not to involve families into their hostilities. Even JRL at that time echoed same assertions and urged everyone spare families. But today villages, towns and localities of Kashmir especially in southern districts of Kashmir are witnessing a reign of fresh arrests wherein family members of those in armed and political struggle are being arrested, tortured and humiliated by police, SOG and other occupational forces.
The JRL leaders said scores of family members of those in resistance have been arrested from Tral, Pulwama, Shopian, Kulgam, Bijbehara, Sonawari and other areas and are being tortured, beaten and humiliated in lockups by police, SOG and other forces which is exactly opposite to the views expressed by DGP and are highly condemnable.
They said that Kashmiris abducted by the Indian NIA and lodged at Tihar Delhi are also facing same torture. Aasiya Andrabi, Fahmida Sofi and Naheeda Nasreen who were recently shifted to this jail have been put into different cells where they are not even allowed to walk for some minutes.
Similarly in other barracks where Shabir Ahmad Shah, Altaf Ahmad Shah, Shahid-ul-Islam, Ayaz Akbar, Peer Saif-u-ullah, Raja Meraj-u-Din Kalwal, Nayeem Ahmed Khan, Farooq Ahmed Dar, Zahoor Ahmad Watali, and Shahid Yousuf Shah, Muhammad Aslam Wani, Muzafar Ahmad Dar have been kept, water scarcity, lack of electricity in these hot months, lack of medicines and poor quality of food has made lives of inmates miserable. Likewise Kuthowa jail, Udhampor jail, Kot-balwal jail, Hira-Nagar jail, Srinagar central jail, Jammu Amphala Jail and other jails have been turned into the worst concentration camps where inmates are tortured, beaten, put in solitary confinements and humiliated at daily basis.
The JRL leders said that Kashmir is a police state every kind of political dissent is being crushed with military might. The JRL leaders said that India being a signatory to the Geneva Convention on political prisoners has an obligation to respect the rights of prisoners but as in case of other human rights, India has trampled this right too and is crushing Kashmiri inmates ruthlessly.
They said that thousands of young and old are these days being called to police stations, arrested and put behind bars. This is being done in the name of Independence Day of India which is actually ridiculous. They said that as Eid-ul-Azha is approaching, this spree of arrests has taken an ugly turn and at a time when families of inmates are expecting the release of their dear ones, jails and police stations are being filled up with more and more Kashmiris.
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