BIRMINGHAM (PNI) Several cities across Europe and the UK held conferences to mark Kashmiri Right to Self-Determination Day.
Birmingham in the UK and Vicenza in Italy hosted conferences where Kashmiri, Pakistani and allies spoke and urged international community to press India to hold plebiscite in Indian Illegally occupied Jammu and Kashmir (IIoJK).
“The UN resolutions passed on IIoJK by the United Nations, which give Kashmiris a right to decide their future, are bedrock of freedom movement against India,” said Fahim Kayani, president Tehreek-e-Kashmir UK.
He was addressing the conference, “Colonization of IIoJK and the Right to Self-determination, in Alumrock, hosted by Tehreek-e-Kashmir UK Birmingham branch .
“Any attempt to damage this mandate of the UN will be fought tooth and nail,” Kayani warned.
Kashmiris in IIoJK and around the world, besides Pakistani people and the government, observe Jan. 5 every year as “Kashmiri Right to Self-Determination Day” as this day in 1949, the UN Commission for India and Pakistan (UNCIP) passed its resolution giving the Kashmiri people right to self-determination.
“The UN is highest body which governs international rules and law-based system and giving Kashmiris this right to decide their political future should be preserved and safeguarded,” Kayani said, pointing out that geo-political interests have taken over international rules and regulations.
He said the presence of UN Military Observers Group in Indian and Pakistan (UNMOGIP) “is a fact and this reality cannot be denied that IIoJK is a disputed region.”
“Kashmiris will not allow anyone to fiddle with the disputed nature of the Indian illegally occupied part of Kashmir nor will we allow anyone to exploit the silence of brave Kashmiris in IIoJK,” Kayani said.
Along with the State of Pakistan, Kayani said, “the Kashmiri diaspora groups will have to sit together and engage with other well-meaning civil society and advocacy groups to force the international powers to stop giving India a free pass over Kashmir.”
“The basic cause of all human rights violations in IIoJK is denial of right to self-determination to Kashmiris in IIoJK,” he said.
Mohammed Ghalib , president of Tehreek-e-Kashmir Europe , reminded the international powers of their responsibility of implementing UN resolutions on IIoJK.
“The non-implementation of the UN resolutions on IIoJK is a slap on the international system i.e. the UN because it shows that countries like India can do anything to hurt international peace and stability,” Ghalib told the conference.
The UN resolutions authorize the people of IIoJK to exercise right to self-determination in a free and unfettered plebiscite to be held under the UN supervision.
“If there has been any party to Kashmir dispute which has hindered bringing long-lasting peace in the UN-recognized disputed region, it is India which didn’t cooperate with the UNCIP in implementing its explicit mission and its underlying UNSC resolution 47 of April 21, 1948, mandating such plebiscite in Kashmir.
Ghalib warned while Kashmiris in IIoJK were facing inhuman conditions, “the non-resolution of Kashmir dispute has put life of nearly two billion under direct threat because India and Pakistan are nuclear-armed nations.”
Supporting the argument of Kayani that any attempt to damage the UN mandate on IIoJK will be tooth and nail, Ghalib said: “India has been moving fast in its dangerous designs of artificial demographic changes in IIoJK which demands Kashmiris in diaspora and State of Pakistani must take things head on and fight India at all levels.”
Other participants at the conference slammed India for non-compliance with the implementation of UN mandated right to self-determination in Jammu and Kashmir.
Ch Babar Warriach, president Tehreek-e-Kashmir Italy, told a conference in the European nation that Kashmiris cannot be denied this universal right of self-determination.
“It may be delayed but people of IIoJK will get their right to decide their future,” said Warraich.
Urging Italian government to use its good offices to force India to hold a plebiscite in IIoJK, Warriach said: “there cannot be double standards. The rule of law and respect to international Conventions has to be upheld by all including India which just give the right to self-determination to Kashmiris in IIoJK.”
The participants at the conferences called out UN’s failure to implement its decision over seven decades which “has led to enormous ongoing suffering on the people of Jammu and Kashmir.”
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