Kashmiri women deliberate targets of Indian state terror: Dr Shugufta
Geneva: Kashmiri woman representative Dr Shugufta Ashraf has said that Kashmiri women continue to suffer systematic rights violations under Indian occupation, with sexual violence being used as a weapon of war in Indian illegally occupied Jammu and Kashmir.
According to Kashmir Media Service, speaking at an International NGO Forum on the Economic, Social and Cultural Rights of Women, organized by OCAPROCE International on the sidelines of the UN Human Rights Council session in Geneva, Dr Shugufta said Kashmiri women “carry the pain of countless silenced women whose cries are drowned by the thunder of gunfire.”
She maintained that Kashmiri women were being “deliberately targeted as part of the war strategy,” and stressed that sexual violence had been deployed “systematically as an instrument of domination” by Indian forces in the territory.
Despite immense hardships, she said, Kashmiri women have preserved their cultural identity “through lullabies whispered under curfews, embroidery stitched in silence, and stories told in secret gatherings.”
Dr Shugufta urged the international community to take immediate action, demanding an end to the use of sexual violence as a weapon of war, accountability of perpetrators under international law, and restoration of the Kashmiris’ right to self-determination.
She concluded that “sustainable peace cannot be built on the broken bodies of women,” adding that empowering Kashmiri women was central to achieving lasting peace in South Asia.
