Jammu & Kashmir has never been a part of India & nor it will be: Saima Saleem

NEW YORK, Sep 24 (SABAH): Pakistani Counsellor Saima Saleem has categorically said that Jammu and Kashmir has never been a part of India and nor it will be.

She stated this in a right of reply to India during the General Debate of High-Level Week of the 78th Session of the General Assembly.

Saima Saleem said the final disposition of Jammu and Kashmir will be determined by its people through an UN-supervised plebiscite as per Security Council’s resolutions.  She said India accepted the Security Council resolutions. It is obliged to implement them under Article 25 of the UN Charter. It has failed to do so, through fraud and force.

The Counsellor said Instead, India has sought to suppress the Kashmiri demand for their right to self-determination and freedom, by imposing a cruel occupation. She said since 1989, over a hundred thousand Kashmiris have been killed.

Saima Saleem recalled that on 5 August 2019, India gave up all pretence and announced the annexation of Jammu and Kashmir. It enlarged its occupation army to 900,000, imposed a complete “lockdown”, turning the beautiful Valley of Kashmir into the largest open-air prison in the world. The entire Kashmiri population is the victim of India’s brutal tactics. She further said that information blackout has been imposed by closing media houses and charging independent journalists with terrorism.

The Counsellor said despite the worst kind of oppression the Kashmiris are facing, they have not given up the demand for freedom from Indian rule. She said India may forcibly occupy the land of Kashmir but it has lost its people forever.

Saima Saleem the second lie is to describe the Kashmiri freedom struggle as terrorism. This is a familiar colonial ploy. Under international law, the Kashmiri resistance to foreign occupation is just and legal. It is India’s oppression that is illegal. It is India which must be held accountable for its war crimes and human rights violations in occupied Jammu and Kashmir.

The Counsellor referred that two reports of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights have documented these crimes and violations. Over a dozen Special Rapporteurs of the Human Rights Council have called for the investigation of the human rights violations in Jammu and Kashmir. India has consistently denied them access to the occupied territory.

She said the third Indian lie is to portray itself as a victim of terrorism. On the contrary, India is a serial sponsor of terrorism. It has perpetrated terrorism against each one of its immediate neighbours. Now, India’s terrorist franchise has gone global.

Saima Saleem stressed that Pakistan has solid evidence of Indian sponsorship of the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan which has carried out repeated terrorist attacks against Pakistani civilians and military targets. The BLA – Baloch insurgents – is also financed and operated by India. The captured Indian spy, Naval Commander Kulbhushan Yadav, has fully enumerated India’s terrorist activities in his confession. India must be held accountable for its terrorist activities.

Highlighting plight of the minorities living in India, Saim Saleem said the BJP-RSS government is guilty of imposing a reign of terror, not only against innocent Kashmiris, but also its own 200 million Muslims, two million Christians and millions of Dalits and other “low-caste” Hindus. India’s crimes are well-documented.

She said 525 attacks took place against Christians, including the recent inhuman massacre of Christians by Hindu tribes in North-East India in the first eight months of the current year. Since 2018, 100,000 cases of crimes were registered against Dalits. Thousands of Sikhs were killed at the Golden Temple in organized riots in 1984 and thereafter.

The Pakistani representative said that India will not halt these violations of human rights and international law until its sense of impunity is removed. She said the world must stop giving India free pass for strategic reasons.