The Kashmiri-American Council has fully endorsed the APHC call for peaceful protest on Martyrs Day on Wednesday in recognition of sacrifices rendered by all those who laid down their lives for the cause of Kashmiris' freedom.
Head of Washington-based Body, Dr Ghulam Nabi Fai said Kashmiri Americans joined the world-wide Kashmiri community in solemn recognition of July 13 and supported All Parties Hurriyet Conference (APHC) for a peaceful protest towards the Martyrs Graveyard that would include Kashmiri men, women and children of all cultural persuasions.
This somber day commemorates the ultimate sacrifice made by 22 unarmed Kashmiris who were ruthlessly slaughtered by the illegitimate Dogra regime on July 13, 1931. "July 13 is forever scarred in the collective minds of the people of Kashmir as the day when the freedom movement was greeted with bullets. Now, 'Martyrs Day' memorialises all those innocent victims, nearly 100,000, who have been forcibly silenced since 1989 by the Indian military and paramilitary forces," Fai said.
He expressed concern over tragic situation because all available evidence testified that human rights violations in Kashmir were systematic, deliberate, and officially sanctioned. Far from seeking to rectify its atrocious human rights record, India has legalised its state-sponsored terrorism in Kashmir.
It had given its occupation forces powers to shoot to kill and the license to abuse the people of Kashmir in whatever ways they like to suppress the popular movement for basic human rights and human dignity, he added. "The studied unconcern by the United Nations has given a sense of total impunity to India. It has also created the impression that the United Nations is invidiously selective about the application of the principles of human rights and democracy," Fai stressed.
Fai reminded that Amnesty International (AI) report, "A Lawless Law: Detention Under the Jammu and Kashmir Public Safety Act (PSA)," dated March 2011 says that "It is widely understood amongst legal community in Srinagar (Capitol City of Kashmir) that confessions and disclosure statements made in police custody are a result of torture and other ill-treatment."
New Delhi, he said, should listen to one of it's prominent novelists, Arundhati Roy who said "It's (Kashmir) not ever been really a part of India, which is why it's ridiculous for the Indian government to keep saying it's an integral part of India. But that armed struggle claimed the lives of 68,000 people, because India today has 500,000 troops manning that little valley. It's the highest, most militarised zone in the world."
Roy added India had done everything wrong there." Apart from a military occupation, it has completely rigged elections. It has changed that valley into a little sort of puddle, a little pool of spies and informers and intelligence networks and torture chambers."
Fai referred to a noted academics, Professor Angana Chatterji who said for over two decades now, egregious human rights violations, enacted with impunity by the Indian military and paramilitary, had been integral to the policy of the Indian state in Kashmir. "The use of torture, disappearances, sexualised violence, and killings by institutions of the Indian state have been utilised as strategies in militarization.
Dr Fai appealed to President Obama to intervene in this tragic situation and reminded him of his pledge which he gave on July 10, 2009 at L'Aquila, Italy, "We don't want stronger nations bullying weaker nations. On the other hand, where you have nations that are oppressing their people, isn't there an international responsibility to intervene?"
Fai discounted the United States hopes that the Kashmir dispute could be settled through bilateral peaceful talks between India and Pakistan. He recounted the litany of failed bilateral efforts and said the people of Kashmir had steadfastly maintained that tripartite talks are the only way to resolve the Kashmir issue. The people of Kashmir are committed to finding a just and lasting peace to the disputed territory of Kashmir through negotiations between Governments of India & Pakistan and the accredited leadership of the State of Jammu and Kashmir, he said.