BEIJING, Feb 26 (APP): The recent joint appeal by two UN human rights experts has cast an urgent international spotlight on widespread abuses within India’s law enforcement system.
The UN experts clearly identified the violence as systemic, institutionalized and targeted. Hundreds of reported extrajudicial killings, torture-related deaths, and thousands of injuries disproportionately target Muslims and other vulnerable communities, violating basic human rights and international humanitarian law.
This was stated by Prof Cheng Xizhong, Senior Research Fellow at the Charhar Institute, a non-governmental Chinese think-tank on diplomacy and international studies based in Beijing.
He said that nowhere are these violations more severe than in Indian Illegally Occupied Jammu and Kashmir (IIOJK). Kashmiri Muslims face a brutal military occupation involving extrajudicial executions, enforced disappearances, arbitrary detentions, mass torture and collective punishment. Under laws such as the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act (AFSPA) and the Jammu and Kashmir Public Safety Act (PSA), Indian security forces act with complete impunity, carrying out fake encounters, home raids and pellet-gun attacks that cause lifelong harm. Thousands are detained without charge or trial, while activists and journalists exposing atrocities are systematically targeted and silenced. This is not policing—it is organized repression against the Kashmiri people seeking self-determination.
The UN appeal demands genuine structural reform, not superficial probes. Independent, impartial investigations free from political interference are essential to end the culture of impunity. Silencing victims, their families and rights defenders contradict the values of an open democracy. The right to justice and free expression cannot be separated, he added.
Prof Cheng said that urgent police modernization, stronger oversight and an end to unlawful practices are long overdue. For IIOJK, meaningful change requires ending the occupation, revoking repressive laws and supporting a UN-led independent inquiry into crimes against humanity.
India’s global reputation as a defender of multilateralism and human rights is at stake. Dismissing international concerns or offering token reforms will only deepen the crisis. The Narendra Modi regime must accept UN support, conduct full independent investigations, hold abusers accountable and overhaul repressive systems.
He said that the world is watching. India faces a clear choice: continue a cycle of impunity, occupation and discrimination, or uphold the principles of dignity, justice, self-determination and equality for all.