Shabir Shah expresses concerns over worsening human rights situation in Occupied Kashmir

SRINAGAR, Sep 4 (SABAH): Senior APHC leader Shabir Ahmed Shah has voiced his grave concern over the continued bloodshed and human rights violations at the hands of Indian occupational forces in Occupied Kashmir.

In his message from Tihar jail, the illegally detained leader, while referring to the recent acts of state terrorism in which innocent youth were killed in different areas of the Kashmir valley, said that during socalled operations innocent civilians particularly youth were being deliberately targeted and martyred after being labelled as “militants” .

“On the one hand Indian government has let loose its forces to kill Kashmiris while on the other NIA has been given a free hand to target and silence political activists and members of civil society who have refused to accept the government dictates”, Shah said, adding that attachment and confiscation of properties of Hurriyat leaders was part of the India’s apartheid regime’s clampdown campaign to silence legitimate political voices in Kashmir.

Shah said that in pursuit of the Israeli settler colonialism model the Modi regime continues to confiscate the Kashmiris’ lands and properties.

“Houses, lands, offices of the Kashmiri people are being seized to create a climate of fear and force them to subjugation”, he said, adding that government employees were being terminated on flimsy grounds. He, however, maintained that such mean tactics by New Delhi won’t deter Kashmiris from pursing their collective cause of freedom.

The illegally detained Hurriyat leader urged the world human rights organizations to take effective notice of the matter and help stop bloodshed and violence, persecution and victimisation of political leaders and activists in the region.

Shah also voiced grave concern over the fast spreading drug menace in the Kashmir valley and termed it as a deep rooted conspiracy against the Kashmiri nation. He said that the drug mafia working under the government patronage has turned the valley into a drug den where innocent people particularly the youth were being lured into drugs.

Shah said that after failing to suppress the Kashmiris’ struggle by using its military might, the Indian government was shamelessly using narcotics in Kashmir as a weapon of war against the Kashmiris.