World powers must join hands to resolve Kashmir issue: Imran

ISLAMABAD: Prime Minister Imran Khan has said that the three major world powers -- the United States, China and Russia -- should join hands to help resolve several international issues, including the longstanding Kashmir dispute."The worst in this (Kashmir) case is unimaginable that the two nuclear armed countries getting into conflict. The only way is that US President Trump, Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping use their influence to settle the issue," Imran Khan said in an interview with Russia Today telecast on Friday.

The prime minister said what New Delhi was doing in Indian Occupied Kashmir (IOK) was going to have consequences way beyond India and the Sub-Continent.

"This is now going to become a nuclear hotspot. If this becomes a flashpoint of conflict between Pakistan and India, the two nuclear armed countries will come face to face. This is why the world should now act," he said.

He said Pakistan was opposed to India’s irrational madness, and called upon the international community to realise its responsibility. "No rational human being can talk of a nuclear war. No one wins that war," he added.

The prime minister said the United Nations and the European countries, including Britain, France and Germany, needed to play their role in highlighting the humanitarian crisis of Kashmir following the unilateral step of abrogating the occupied valley’s special status. "They have to understand that this problem could spiral out of control," he said, adding that Pakistan would use every forum, including the United Nations and the International Court of Justice (ICJ), to highlight the atrocities in IOK.

The only solution to the Kashmir issue, he said, was the implementation of UN Security Council resolutions and as per the aspirations of Kashmiris. He said the Modi government had taken an extremely wrong decision and it would not be able to suppress the explosive freedom movement in IOK and would have to give Kashmiris the right to self-determination.

To a question about chances of improved ties between Islamabad and New Delhi, Imran Khan said, “No one should expect that bilateral talks between Pakistan and India would give some results. As long as they are putting curfew on eight million people in Kashmir, there is no question of talking to them at the moment.”

On the US pull-out from Afghanistan, he said it should not be made until there was a political settlement there. “The settlement has to be inclusive and planned. The US should not leave as the USSR did leaving behind chaos,” he said, adding that Pakistan had facilitated the Afghan peace process by urging the Taliban to sit down and talk to the Americans.

On accusation of giving space to terror groups in Pakistan, he categorically stated that his government had taken steps and it would not allow any terror group. He pointed out that India was using Afghan soil to perpetrate terrorism in Pakistan. The prime minister said despite the UNSC resolutions, the plebiscite could not be held in Kashmir. “The more India used force by deploying around 900,000 troops, the stronger the desire for freedom became among the people,” he added.

He said the issue was that they had now made IOK part of India by changing its demography. “The Indian government tried to settle Hindus in IOK to convert the Muslim majority into a minority,” he said.

Imran Khan said during the last 30 years, more or less 100,000 people had been killed by the Indian security forces in IOK that had been turned into the most militarised zone in the world. He said the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government had not only violated the international human rights laws, including the Geneva Convention, but also India’s own constitution, besides the ideology of Indian forefathers who had promised rights to the Kashmiri people. He feared that the Indian government would carry out the genocide of Muslims in the territory as it was not allowing the media as well as the Indian opposition parties to enter the valley.

Regarding inaction by the international community, the prime minister said unfortunately, the markets, trade and material gains were more important than the human beings. He opined that the RSS ideology would not only be destructive for the Kashmiri people, but also for the 200 Muslims of India. He said one billion Indians were under threat as they had been taken over by the extremist mindset of RSS.