Rallies call for end to genocide of Muslims in Held Kashmir

LAHORE : Rallies and protests marked the Kashmir solidarity day on Saturday as tens of thousands of slogan chanting marchers took to major roads and commercial avenues across the country, demanding immediate end to genocide of Kashmiri Muslims, reversing India’s annexation of disputed valley violating international laws and norms, and ensuring the right to self-determination to Kashmiris guaranteed by UN resolutions over seven decades ago.

In Lahore JI secretary general Amirul Azeem led a rally on Mall Road which was also addressed by Supreme Court Bar Association President Ahsan Bhoon. Jamaat-e-Islami Ameer Sirajul Haq demanded the government give a roadmap for the freedom of Occupied Kashmir from Indian yoke and called for holding an OIC meeting in Islamabad on agenda of Kashmir.

Amirul Azeem condemned UN and western powers for keeping criminal silence on gross human rights abuses by Indian army in occupied Kashmir despite that Kashmiris are demanding their right to self-determination from the UN. Azeem lamented that Prime Minister Imran Khan was enjoying Olympic games whereas he should have been in the country on Kashmir Solidarity Day to lead the protests from the forefront.

He said PTI government like the previous regimes failed to fight for Kashmir cause and keeping a criminal inactivity after Modi regime occupied the Muslim majority state by making constitutional amendments in violations of UN guarantees. He said the Pakistani nation and the JI were standing side by side with the Kashmir people in their freedom struggle. He regretted the human rights abuses range from mass killings, forced disappearances, torture, rape and sexual abuse to suppression of freedom of speech and bans on religious gatherings continued in the occupied valley for over two and half years. Entire occupied Kashmir, he said, had been under a lockdown for nearly two years as thousands of Kashmiris were detained without charge, including former chief ministers, political leaders, opposition activists, lawyers, and journalists, he said, questing the silence of the UN and western powers on rights abuses in the held area.

He said since August 2019 when Modi government revoked the special constitutional status of Jammu and Kashmir and split the province into two separate federally governed territories, Indian army’s human right abuses had increased manifold with several hundred people had been killed. He cited world media that Modi government shifted over 29,000 Kashmiris from Kashmir to different Indian jails in past 29 months. The funeral prayer of iconic Kashmiri leader Syed Ali Gilani was not allowed to be offered in open place and his dead body was buried in midnight under the shadows of guns of Indian army, he said He said the Pakistani rulers must realise that the Modi government was bent upon changing the demography of held area. For the purpose, he said, it settled Hindus population from different parts of India to Kashmir with an objective to change Muslim majority of the region into minority. If the rulers of Pakistan failed to check the design of New Delhi, he said, Pakistan will lose its jugular vein forever. He vowed to continue struggle for Kashmir cause.