JKCHR concerned over Hindu groups’ letter to Labour

LONDON: The Jammu and Kashmir Council for Human Rights (JKCHR) has raised concern over a joint letter by 191 Hindu groups and organisations to the Labour Party expressing their annoyance over the party’s emergency motion on Kashmir, and stressed it should serve as an eye opener.

JKCHR President Dr Syed Nazir Gilani, in a letter to Azad Jammu and Kashmir President Sardar Masood Khan on Tuesday, said such a move should not be regarded as the end of “counter narrative used against the imprisoned people in the Valley and against Pakistan”.

Dr Gilani said the joint letter had raised the bogey of divisions due to Brexit and added “ramifications for community harmony” due to bringing Kashmir into the domestic politics of the UK. “We have not equipped Labour Party with right arguments and there is no denying the fact that the Labour Party would run into difficulty. We may gradually lose our friends and we should not let it happen,” he added.

The JKCHR president said it was the 100th day of a renewed Indian aggression, occupation and imprisonment of “our brothers, sisters and elders in the Valley”.“These people are known to the United Nations for the last 72 years and very rightly recorded as ‘…the people of Jammu and Kashmir , who are worthy of the right of their own self-determination through a free, secure and impartial plebiscite. They are a people of legend, song and story, associated with snow-capped mountains, beautiful valleys and life giving waters’”.

He said: “I join you (Sardar Masood) in expressing my disappointment with Britain the November President of UNSC for not scheduling Kashmir situation for any discussion. We need to admit that your Tweet and my disappointment do not seem to have any merit because Ambassador Pierce has qualified her statement and said, ‘We have not picked Kashmir because the Security Council had an opportunity to discuss it recently and we have not been asked by any other Security Council member to schedule a meeting’.”

The JKCHR president stated: “It means that you (Sardar Masood) either did not pursue it during your October 2019 visit to UK or have failed in convincing at least one of the 15 members of UN Security Council.” He stressed: “We have to follow a proactive programme to examine the UN jurisprudence on Kashmir and how to activate it.”