Toronto, July 07, 2018 (PPI-OT): The President of Azad Jammu and Kashmir, Sardar Masood Khan has said that India must act on the recommendations made by the UN Human Rights Council report to stop rights abuses in occupied Kashmir. Sardar Masood Khan was addressing Canadian parliamentarians and prominent Pakistani-Canadians invited by Pakistan Consul General in Toronto, Imran Siddiqui.
“It is time”, the President said, “India should take responsibility, accept the findings of the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights and take steps to cooperate in the conduct of impartial international investigation of the human rights crisis in the occupied territory.” He demanded that India’s unrelenting spate of killings, mass blindings by the use of pellet guns, arbitrary detention, torture and enforced disappearances must be terminated. He added that according to Indian official accounts more than 6, 221 Kashmiris have been injured by the pellet gun, out of which 17 have died and more that 200, including children, have lost their eyesight completely.
Appreciating Canada’s strong commitment to the promotion and protection of human rights, the President appealed to the Western nations to cease appeasement of India, a practice that had emboldened it to commit crimes against humanity with impunity in the occupied Kashmir. He also urged the international community to put pressure on India to repeal its two draconian laws – the Armed Forces Special Powers Act and the Public Safety Act – that were being used to brutalize the people of Kashmir.
The President lambasted restrictions imposed by the occupation authorities on Hurriyet leaders, Syed Ali Gilani, Mirwaiz Umar Farooq, Muhammad Ashraf Sehrai, Muhammad Yasin Malik, Zafar Akbar Butt and Bilal Siddiqi to prevent various events planned by the Joint Resistance Leadership on the eve of the second anniversary of Burhan Wani’s martyrdom.
He also condemned illegal detention of Chairperson of Dukhtaran-e-Millat, Aasiya Andrabi, Nahida Nasreen and Fehmeeda Sofi on trumped up charges. “They are human rights defenders, not criminals; they must be released,” he added. “Instead of subjecting peace activists to arbitrary detentions and torture, India should cooperate with the Human Rights Council in credible investigations of instances of sexual violence, including use of rape and molestation as an instrument of war, by the occupation forces and of unmarked mass graves, which are remains of forcibly disappeared Kashmir Muslims”, the President said.
Masood Khan reiterated the Kashmiris’ resolve to win their freedom and get their right to self-determination; and underlined their conviction that the path towards resolution of the Kashmir dispute was dialogue and diplomacy, not India’s use of state terrorism.
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