India fails to suppress Kashmir freedom movement, says AJK PM

KARACHI: Azad Jammu and Kashmir Prime Minister Raja Farooq Haider on Tuesday said India by using brutal force could not suppress the indigenous and popular freedom movement.

He was addressing media persons during his visit to the Karachi Press Club. Haider in his talk condemned the unending curfew, lockdown and human rights violations in the Indian Occupied Kashmir and said he and the AJK government have been exposing brutalities and false narrative of the Indian government at all available forums. “The occupied Kashmir is under curfew since August 5, where over 8 million people have been confined to their homes and denied fundamental rights,” he informed Karachi’s journalists. Despite the months’ long inhuman curfew, the Indian government has failed to defeat the resolve and determination of Kashmiris, he said.

Haider said the aggressive and expansionist designs of the Modi’s government are pushing South Asia towards instability and creating chaos in the region. He said the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party in India has been working on promotion of its ‘Akhand Bharat ideology’ which is not only affecting Muslims in India but other minorities living there also.

“The new textbooks taught at Indian schools are full of ideologies of the ‘Akhand Bharat’ ideology, where they have shown Pakistan, Afghanistan, Bangladesh, and Nepal as part of ‘greater India.’

He said India has never remained secular and for Kashmiris, both the Congress and the BJP are similar and they did not expect any good from them.

“Modi and the RSS previously massacred Muslims in Gujrat and now they are repeating the same in Kashmir.” The AJK premier also stressed that the Kashmir issue also needs practical support, rather than mere diplomatic and moral support. He underlined the need to evolve a comprehensive strategy to foil the nefarious designs of India against Pakistan and Kashmir.

Haider said the government and residents of the AJK will not abandon the Indian-occupied Kashmir alone at this critical time when India unilaterally and illegally revoked Articles 370 and 35-A and was conspiring to alter the demography of the disputed territory by settling non-state subjects in the occupied territory.

Mentioning the targeting of civilians along the Ceasefire Line with both light and heavy weapons, he said that Modi’s government has not only crossed all limits of brutalities in occupied Kashmir, but it is also targeting schools and hospitals.

He said Kashmiris are demanding their UN-mandated right to self-determination, while India is using brute force to crush them.

The AJK prime minister also appealed to the UN and other international human rights organizations to take notice of the humanitarian crisis and war crimes in occupied Kashmir.