ISLAMABAD, Feb 4 (APP):President Dr Arif Alvi on Tuesday while reiterating Pakistan’s unflinching political, moral and diplomatic support to the people of Indian Occupied Jammu and Kashmir (IOJ&K) for their right to self- determination, stressed upon the international community to realize the growing extremist Hindutva ideology and the persecution of Kashmiris in IOJ&K and minorities elsewhere in India.
He was addressing a seminar to mark the Kashmir Solidarity Day, titled ‘The Kashmir dispute: an unfulfilled promise’ organized by the Institute of Strategic Studies here at the Aiwan-e-Sadr.
The president reiterated the demands that India should open IOJ&K by lifting the lockdown, allow movement of people and restore Internet and communication facilities, stop blaming Pakistan, and allow international media, news channels and delegations of parliamentarians from other countries to visit the occupied territory.
The Indian government should allow the United Nations Military Observer Group to report on what was happening there and take steps for immediate holding of a plebiscite under the UN Security Council resolutions, he added.
The president said India could no longer suppress the Kashmiris from demanding their inalienable and legal right to freedom.
Citing illegal and unilateral revoking of the special status of IOJ&K and the controversial India Citizenship Act, he president urged the world community to take cognizance of the dire implications of such oppressive and discriminatory designs against minorities, especially the Muslims.
Reiterating solidarity with the oppressed Kashmiri people, he said the whole Pakistani nation was standing with them and would continue highlighting the issue.
He also referred to the proclamation of Prime Minister Imran Khan, who had declared himself as an ambassador for the Kashmiris across the globe.
The president also expressed the hope that the European Union parliament would adopt a resolution on IOJ&K to put further pressure on India.
He said despite India’s aggressive design, Pakistan had always laid insistence upon peace. “Pakistan is a responsible nuclear state, which firmly believes in peace while on the other hand, there is a belligerent and irresponsible neigbour.”
The president said with growing extremist ideology of RSS (Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh) and Hindutva by the Modi-led Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government, India was not only creating problems for herself but also for Pakistan.
If something went wrong inside India, the blame would be directed towards Pakistan, and such thing bothered Pakistan, he added.
The president also stressed upon the need to keep on shaking the world’s conscience and regretted that he was surprised and disappointed over the approach at the global level, which was mainly driven by trade, hegemony and business deals devoid of morality.
He said Pakistan had been doing its utmost to get the Kashmir issue resolved in accordance with the wishes of Kashmiris and the UN resolutions.
“Pakistan believes in peace. Pakistanis and Kashmiris believe in the UN to hold a plebiscite in IOJ&K as promised by it,” he added.
The Indian occupation forces had been massacring the innocent Kashmiris and raping women on an unprecedented scale as tools to suppress their will for freedom, he said.
He said under a deliberate conspiracy, during the pre-partition era, India was provided access to Kashmir through usurpation of Gurdaspur and since then, Kashmir had been the unfinished agenda of partition as repeatedly highlighted by the Founder of Pakistan Quaid-e-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah.
The president said what was happening inside India amounted to the BJP government’s playing with the fire and cited Khushwant Singh’s book ‘End of India’ published during 2003, in which the author had predicted doom for India, saying the country would destroy itself within.
He said the extremist people behind the massacre of Muslims in Indian Gujrat were protected and given a safe passage by Narendra Modi, when he was a chief minister.
The president said what had happened in Myanmar against Muslims, similar things were planned against the Muslims and Kashmiris.
He said even prisons had been created for those people in Assam, who failed to prove their citizenship.
Speaking on the occasion, Minister for Kashmir Affairs and Gilgit Baltistan Ali Amin Khan Gandapur said by putting eight million Kashmiris under a relentless lockdown by 900,000 Indian forces was nothing but genocide.
A history of the state-sponsored terrorism, he added, had been created in IOJ&K, which had never been witnessed by the human race in the past.
The minister said in the last seven decades, the Kashmiris were subjected to the worst kind of inhuman torture and aggression.
Most recently, with the use of pellet guns, more than 31,000 Kashmiris had been targeted while about 41,000 were detained, he added.
The seminar was attended by ministers, advisors, Special Assistant to the PM on Information Dr Firdous Ashiq Awan, parliamentarians, ambassadors, Kashmiri leaders and by a large number of people.
Gandapur said the prime minister had offered a peace gesture to India after assuming his office, but that offer was mistaken as a weakness of Pakistan. The desire for peace should not be misconstrued as Pakistan’s weakness as the whole nation and its armed forces were ready to defend the motherland against any aggression, he added.
The prime minister, in his speech at the UN, had exposed agenda of the Modi government, he added.
The minister called upon the world to act and play its role as the situation in India could lead to a disaster affecting the whole region.
He said spy Jhadv’s case was a clear proof of Indian sponsored terrorism inside Pakistan. Different countries of the region had also been victim of Indian sponsored terrorism, he added.
Citing the controversial Indian Citizenship Act, the minister said the butcher of Gujrat was now turning into the butcher of all minorities.
He appealed to the international community to express their solidarity with the Kashmiri people on humanitarian basis. “How much the world wants to test their patience,” he added.
Kashmir Committee Chairman Syed Fakhar Imam, in his address, said the people of IOJ&K had been suffering from a virtual hell as the Indian forces had unleashed acts of barbarism to break their will for self-determination.
He said by revoking the special status of the occupied valley with illegal and unilateral steps, India wanted to turn the Muslim majority into a minority.
The Indian government, however, had miscalculated its move leading to international uproar as even the French parliament discussed the issue for the first time, he added.
Fakhar Imam said now, the whole India had been in turmoil and noted that Modi led trio in the government posed threat to Pakistan.
He said Father of the Nation Quaid-e-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah had already made it clear to all parties that any partition plan without Kashmir would be incomplete.
He said the UN Security Council had also discussed the Kashmir issue after a lapse of about 50 years. It was ripe time for the UN and the global community to immediately intervene and ensure the Kashmiris their right to self- determination as promised to them, he added.
He also gave a historic overview of the dispute leading to the recent Indian actions of revoking the special constitutional status of the occupied Kashmir.
ISS Director General, former ambassador, Aizaz Ahmad Chaudhry said the main purpose of organizing the seminar was to express solidarity with the Kashmiri bracing the worst inhuman atrocities.
He said after August 5 last year, the international media raised its voice against India’s unilateral and illegal steps.
All Parties Hurriyat Conference (APHC) Convenor Syed Faiz Naqshbandi also highlighted the plight of Kashmiris in IOJ&K.
He said with observance of solidarity day on February 5, they would give a clear and loud message to the world that the Kashmiris were not alone in their struggle for right to self-determination.
On 14th August every year, the Kashmiris regularly hoisted Pakistan’s national flag and observed 15th August as a black day, which was a referendum against the Indian occupation, he added.
