Pakistan expresses concerns over maltreatment, HR violations by India in IIOJK
Islamabad: Pakistan has expressed concerns over the maltreatment and human rights violations committed by the Indian administration and the Indian occupation forces in Indian Illegally Occupied Jammu and Kashmir (IIOJK).
According to Kashmir Media Service, Foreign Office Spokesperson Tahir Hussain Andrabi in a statement in Islamabad said the fresh wave of arbitrary arrests is not new and in fact this has been going on, in general, for the past seven or eight decades – more so since August 2019, when India repealed the special status of Indian illegally occupied Jammu and Kashmir. He said since then, these arbitrary arrests and detentions have increased.
He said some individuals have languished in jail without due process for months and even years. He said, “We will continue to raise our concerns on these issues. The international community, United Nations human rights machinery, and civil society organizations are being briefed constantly on this issue. So, this issue remains our focus in the broader context of our support for the human rights of the people of Indian Illegally Occupied Jammu and Kashmir.”
The Spokesperson said this human rights dimension is linked to the overall peace and security dimension of the Kashmir dispute, as well as its legal status and India, as an occupying power, is duty-bound under international law, particularly international humanitarian law, to uphold the human rights of the Kashmiri people.
Tahir Andrabi said the killing of a police officer in the line of duty is a heinous and condemnable act but detaining over three thousand people and demolishing the homes of families of two ‘militants’ amounts to collective punishment that has no place in a democracy.
If the Indian government itself maintains that militancy has been reduced to near zero it must adopt a more humane and lawful approach towards innocent civilians instead of resorting to tit for tat for an entire community, he remarked.
