At UN, Pakistan denounces India’s attempt to equate Kashmiris’ self-determination struggle with terrorism

At UN, Pakistan says Hong Kong affairs are China's internal matters
At UN, Pakistan says Hong Kong affairs are China's internal matters

UNITED NATIONS, Oct 06 (APP): Pakistan told the United Nations on Tuesday that India was suppressing the Kashmiris’ struggle for self-determination, as an “insufficient” effort has been made to distinguish terrorism from the pursuit of peoples’ legitimate right for self-determination and national liberation.

“The suppression of self-determination and foreign occupation is the worst form of state terrorism,” Ambassador Munir Akram told the General Assembly’s Sixth Committee, which deals with legal matters.

“Terrorism must be defeated comprehensively, everywhere, in all its manifestations. It cannot be addressed selectively,” he said in a debate on ‘Measures to Eliminate International Terrorism’.

“Our neighbour, India, has sought to suppress the legitimate struggle of the people of Indian Illegally Occupied Jammu and Kashmir for the self-determination for seven decades,” he told the committee which began its substantive work on Tuesday.

“This right is inherent; it was promised to the Kashmiri people by the Security Council, and by India and Pakistan,” Ambassador Akram said, adding. “The Kashmiri struggle cannot be suppressed by India’s attempt to equate it with terrorism.”

The Pakistani envoy also said that the global counter-terrorism endeavour has failed to address state terrorism.

Since 1990, he said, India’s occupation and oppression in Kashmir has killed over 100,000 Kashmiris, widowed 22,000 women, orphaned 110,000 children and raped more than 11,000 Kashmiri women.

India’s state terrorism has intensified since 5 August 2019, when New Delhi illegally annexed the disputed territory, arresting all Kashmiri political leaders and activists, abducting and torturing 13,000 Kashmiri, clamping down on peaceful protests, with pellet guns that blind even small children, collective punishments imposed with the destruction of entire villages and neighbourhoods, and hundreds of Kashmiri youth extra-judicially killed in fake encounters.

“Not one Indian soldier has been punished for these crimes which are well recorded in UN, civil society and media reports. Such state terrorism must be punished,” Ambassador Akram said.

Pakistan, he said, was the victim of attacks by terrorist groups, financed and organized by India, from across our western borders.

These groups are responsible for some of the most gruesome terrorist attacks in Pakistan including the attack on the Army Public School in Peshawar, which killed 145 of our innocent children; the attack on the Chinese Consulate in Karachi and last April on the Pakistan Stock Exchange.

“Although every UN resolution states that ‘terrorism should not be linked with any religion’, the use of phrases like ‘jihadis’, ‘Islamists’, radical Islam’, give the lie to such protestations.
There are no non-Muslim groups on the Security Council’s ‘terrorism’ lists,” he said.

“The pronunciations of some political leaders in certain countries, which pride themselves on their ‘civilization’, feed into this anti-Islamic prejudice: When a crime is committed by a Muslim, it is immediately categorized as ‘terrorism’; when committed by a non-Muslim, it is simply a crime.

Noting the the presence of many non-Muslim terrorists or extremists, the Pakistani envoy said, “There is indeed a surge in the emergence of right-wing, extremist and fascist movements in several countries which are responsible for a larger number of terrorist and violent acts than those committed by Muslims in their countries.

“Such Islamophobia is in fact state policy in BJP-RSS ruled India. Inspired by the Nazis, ‘Hitler’s Hindus’ are embarked on the hate project of purifying ‘Mother India’ from its Islamic legacy by forcibly converting, expelling or rendering stateless, India’s 200 million Muslims.

Two million Muslims have been made stateless in Assam; Muslim migrants called ‘termites’. Organized pogroms committed against Muslims – from Gujrat in 2002 to Delhi in 2020; Muslims lynched openly by ‘Cow vigilantes’; Muslims blamed for spreading COVID by the BJP-RSS leaders and the mainstream media.

“The RSS and associated Hindu terror groups, as well as similar fascist groups elsewhere, deserve to be placed on a comprehensive list of terrorists.

As proposed in the OIC statement, the 1267 Committee should enlarge its lists to include these right-wing terrorist and fascist groups, like the RSS.”

Ambassador Akram also underscored the need to address the root causes of terrorism like: injustice, oppression, foreign intervention and occupation and suppression of the right of peoples to self-determination.

“The proliferating conflicts across the world are a clear signal that the UN and the international community have failed to address these root causes of conflicts and accompanying manifestations of terrorist violence.”

Global cooperation, he said, had succeeded in defeating the ‘core’ of the major terrorist organizations – Al-Qaeda and ISIS (Daesh).

“Yet, their assoociates and affiliates have survived and terrorism has spread across the world. And, terrorism is manifesting itself in various new and mutated forms which are not being effectively addressed.”

Pakistan, he said, looks forward to the forthcoming review of the UN’s Counter-terrorism strategy to address the shortcomings of our current policies and actions during the current session of the General Assembly.

 

APP Services