Violence in Kashmir

India has a strategy it always follows whenever it is receiving too much international scrutiny for its human rights abuses in Kashmir. It blames the violence on the victims, accuses them of being terrorists and claims freedom fighters are nothing more than pawns of Pakistan. It then tries to create an incident with Pakistan so that the world’s attention is shifted away from the indefensible occupation of Kashmir. This is exactly what happened this past Sunday as 14 people were killed after an explosive was detonated in the middle of a crowd protesting the occupation of Kashmir. The Indian army immediately blamed the protesters for setting off the explosive even though the security forces are notorious for their use of explosives to disperse crowds and target protesters. Then, right on cue, India claimed that five supposed terrorists had been killed after trying to cross the Line of Control. As always, it was unable to provide any proof for this allegation. The convenient timing made it clear that India was once again distracting from its criminality by engaging Pakistani troops across the Line of Control. This brazen brinksmanship has not led to a serious escalation till now because of restraint shown by the Pakistani side. Should the same tactic continue to be used, however, the risk of conflict only increases.

In the face of this Indian provocation, Prime Minister Imran Khan’s response was measured. He condemned the Kashmir killings but rather than matching India’s threatening posture he called only for dialogue to resolve the Kashmir dispute. The chances of India taking up this invitation to talks are close to zero. The purpose of this statement was to show that Pakistan is the reasonable party that only wants a diplomatic solution in line with UN resolutions on Kashmir. India’s previous stance has been that Kashmir is a bilateral and not a multilateral issue. Now it is not even willing to hold one-on-one talks with Pakistan. The occupation of Kashmir has so dehumanised India that there is no reasoning with it. It sees all its foes as terrorists and, as eventually happens to all occupiers, is more than willing to use torture and murder as a tool of its policy. The negligible turnout in the recent local government elections in Kashmir showed just how fed up the Kashmiri people are of Indian occupation. How much longer can the international community avert its gaze from the ugly reality of what is happening in Kashmir?