India Rejects Pakistan, OIC Remarks on Jammu and Kashmir at UN Rights Council

Geneva — India rejected what it called “baseless and malicious allegations” by Pakistan at the United Nations Human Rights Council and dismissed references to Jammu and Kashmir by the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation, reaffirming that the region is an integral part of the country.

Speaking at the council’s 62nd session, Anupama Singh, first secretary at India’s Permanent Mission to the United Nations, accused Pakistan of using international forums to spread propaganda and conceal its domestic failures and support for terrorism.

“India is compelled to exercise its right of reply in response to the references made to it by Pakistan and the OIC. We categorically reject the baseless and malicious allegations made by Pakistan. We also categorically reject the references to J&K made by the OIC. Pakistan’s propaganda is designed to mask its domestic failures and support for terrorism. Its misuse of the OIC coordinator’s role only reinforces deception. We have no desire to dignify such propaganda,” Singh said.

“For the record, Jammu and Kashmir was, is, and will always remain an integral and inalienable part of India. The only unresolved issue is Pakistan’s illegal occupation of Indian territories and their return. Pakistan’s propaganda cannot obscure the reality of repression in Pakistan-occupied Jammu and Kashmir,” she added.

Singh said unrest in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir was the result of decades of military control, repression and the denial of fundamental rights.

“The ongoing tragedy in Rawalakot, the killing of hundreds of civilians, and the brutal crackdown across Pakistan-occupied Jammu and Kashmir are the predictable outcome of a system built on forcible occupation and sustained through repression. Decades of military land grabs, demographic engineering, and the denial of basic freedoms have brought matters to a point where even demand for bread, electricity, rights, and dignity are met with bullets and brutality. This should surprise no one. An illegal and illegitimate occupation can be sustained only through force,” she said.

The Indian diplomat also accused Pakistan of using terrorism as an instrument of state policy while portraying itself as a victim.

“This is the country where the sitting Defence Minister boasts of hosting, training, and deploying terrorists as state policy, and yet Pakistan calls itself a victim of terrorism. Indeed, a paradox which only Pakistan could sustain. It is a living example of a Frankenstein state which is shocked when its own monster bites back,” Singh said.

Addressing the Indus Waters Treaty, Singh said Pakistan could not continue demanding the benefits of cooperation and goodwill while supporting terrorism. She also described the 1960 agreement as outdated.

“Our position on Indus Water Treaty is well known. It defies logic that a state which exports terror as an instrument of policy continues to demand the privileges of cooperation predicated on goodwill and friendship. It is equally undeniable that the treaty is now outdated. No technical arrangement can remain frozen in time while the world around it is transformed. A treaty negotiated in 1960 cannot be treated as a perpetual entitlement, which is insulated from accountability, detached from present-day realities, and untouched by the profound changes of the past six decades,” she said. (Source: IANS)