UNITED NATIONS, Jun 27 (APP): Highlighting the plight of Children living under foreign occupation, Pakistan on Wednesday criticized the United Nations for ignoring the suffering of Kashmiri children in its report on \u2018Children and Armed Conflict\u2019, calling the omission \u201cunjust.\u201d<\/p>\n
Speaking in the UN Security Council, which met under South Korea\u2019s presidency, Ambassador Munir Akram said the situation of children in Indian-occupied Jammu and Kashmir had been unjustly omitted this time, despite their ongoing suffering under foreign occupation.<\/p>\n
\u201cGenerations of Kashmiri children have grown up amidst fear of violence and repression under foreign occupation,\u201d the Pakistani envoy told the 15-member Council.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe report\u2019s most glaring and persistent failure and double standard has been its selective omission of certain situations, most importantly, the children of Palestine. It has taken the killing of 14,000 children in the (ongoing) Gaza war for Israel to be included in the report (this year).\u201d<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, Ambassador Akram added, \u201cthe plight of children in Indian-occupied Jammu and Kashmir, previously included in the reports, has been unjustly omitted, despite their ongoing suffering under foreign occupation.<\/p>\n
Detailing the plight of children in the occupied territories, where human rights violations are \u201ctragically routine\u201d, the Pakistan envoy said, adding \u201cWe vividly recall the heart-wrenching image of a three-year old Kashmiri boy sitting in shock on his grandfather\u2019s lifeless body just murdered by Indian soldier; we remember 18-month-old Hiba, her eyes ruptured by pellet guns fired by security forces inside her home in Kapran village of Kashmir.\u201d<\/p>\n
He said that none of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights and several Special Rapporteurs of the Human Rights Council have, who asked for access to Indian-occupied Jammu and Kashmir to investigate the reports of massive violations of human rights, was allowed to go there.<\/p>\n
\u201cI will like to ask the SRSG (Special Representative of the Secretary-General) whether she was able to visit Indian Occupied Kashmir during her visit to India,\u201d Ambassador Akram asked.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Special Rapporteur should investigate and report on the whereabouts and condition of the 13,000 Kashmiri youth who were widely reported to have been \u2018picked up\u2019 and detained by the occupation forces after 5 August 2019 (when India illegally annexed occupied Kashmir). It was also reported that many of them were tortured to extract \u2018confessions\u2019 and deter them and their families from joining the Kashmiri liberation struggle\u201d.<\/p>\n
In 2022, he said, Pakistan provided the United Nations a Dossier of 3432 cases of war crimes, including crimes against women and children, committed by senior officers of the Indian occupying forces, with audio and video evidence. \u201cAmong these are numerous cases of crimes against Kashmiri children,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n
The report last year rightly urged India to implement measures, including the prohibition of the use of lethal and non-lethal force on children, ending the \u201cuse of pellet guns\u201d and preventing all forms of ill-treatment of children in detention, and protection of children from sexual offences, he said.<\/p>\n
Pakistan, Ambassador Akram added, supported the mandate of the SRSG to deal with situations of children in armed conflict.<\/p>\n
However, the Pakistani envoy objected to the references to Pakistan in the Secretary-General\u2019s report, which, he said, are \u201coutside of the mandate of the Special Rapporteur\u201d.<\/p>\n
In this regard, he detailed Pakistan\u2019s extensive legal, policy and operational measures to protect children.<\/p>\n
Opening the discussion, Victoria Gamba, Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Children and Armed Conflict, presenting the Secretary-General\u2019s annual report on children and armed conflict, said that the information presented today \u201chas been obtained in contexts of great hardship and under incredibly difficult circumstances, during a deadly year for United Nations personnel and aid workers\u201d.<\/p>\n
In the 25 countries and one regional situation covered by her mandate, the UN verified 32,990 grave violations against 22,557 children in 2023 \u2014 the highest figures in almost 10 years.<\/p>\n
Across the globe, \u201cchildren bore the brunt of multiplying and escalating crises\u201d, she said, adding that they experienced horrific violence in combat zones, displacement camps, urban areas and their homes and schools.<\/p>\n
A staggering 5,301 children were killed and another 6,348 maimed or injured in 2023, marking a shocking 35 per cent rise over previous years, she reported.<\/p>\n
The use of explosive weapons in densely populated areas, as well as deliberate and indiscriminate attacks against civilians and civilian objects, had a bleak impact on children.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhether armed forces or non-State armed groups, all parties to conflict contributed to this deadly harvest,\u201d Ms. Gamba stated.<\/p>\n
Palestine\u2019s UN Ambassador Riyadh Mansour expressed profound regret that it took a \u201cgenocidal war\u201d against his people to finally add Israel to the \u201clist of shame\u201d this year.<\/p>\n
He highlighted the devastating toll in Gaza, where nearly 16,000 Palestinian children were killed and another 21,000 were missing.<\/p>\n
Gaza, once a vibrant place where children set world records in sports, has now been reduced to a graveyard.<\/p>\n
Ambassador Mansour condemned the erosion of morality witnessed globally during eight months of conflict, as images flooded social media showing Palestinian children starving, injured with severe burns or no limbs, fighting for their lives.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhere is your humanity?\u201d, he asked, calling for \u201ccollective resolve and responsibility to pressure Israel to stop the madness\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cEnforce a ceasefire now, save our and your humanity now,\u201d the Palestinian envoy added.<\/p>\n
The persistent \u201cpolitical appeasement and double standards\u201d made Israel believe it was exempt from the rule of law, he said, dismissing the \u201clie\u201d about \u201cthe Israeli army\u201d as the \u201cmost moral army in the world\u201d.<\/p>\n
There is nothing moral in using attacks against civilians, including children, as a weapon of war, as a tool for political pressure in negotiations, or a catalyst to stay in power, Ambassador Mansour emphasized.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
UNITED NATIONS, Jun 27 (APP): Highlighting the plight of Children living under foreign occupation, Pakistan on Wednesday criticized the United Nations for ignoring the suffering of Kashmiri children in its report on \u2018Children and Armed Conflict\u2019, calling the omission \u201cunjust.\u201d Speaking in the UN Security […]<\/p>\n
\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":109577,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-109607","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\n