GENEVA, Sep 15 (APP): A Pakistani diplomat Wednesday categorically rejected India's sweeping allegations about Pakistan's treatment of its minorities and involvement in terrorism, and called New Delhi the principal sponsor, financier and abettor of state terrorism.
“We have presented concrete evidence in our recent dossier on IIOJK (Indian Illegally Occupied Jammu and Kashmir) that India is providing patronage to ISIS and running training camps,” Junaid Suleman, first secretary at Pakistan Mission to the United Nations office in Geneva, told the UN Human Rights Council during its 48th session.
He was responding to his Indian counterpart Pawan Badhe who, while exercising his right of reply to Pakistani Ambassador Khalil Hashmi’s statement on Tuesday, attacked Pakistan’s human rights record.
Ambassador Hashmi had warned in his statement that the Indian state machinery has turned into a “veritable arm of oppression” in occupied Jammu and Kashmir.
Suleman, the Pakistani diplomat, accused India of stonewalling global scrutiny of its widely documented human rights crimes in occupied Jammu and Kashmir and against its own minorities.
“India consistently violates the sanctity of this august forum by spreading falsehood, lies and disinformation against my country,” he said, citing the independent EU Disinfo Lab, whose two investigative reports of 2019 and 2020, had revealed India’s State-sponsored global disinformation campaign against Pakistan.
In addition, Suleman cited independent media reports that have drawn attention to Indian government’s continuing spying operations against its own citizens, human rights activists, journalists, and world leaders, including the prime minister of Pakistan.
“Keeping a clandestine tab on and silencing dissenting voices is an old textbook ploy of the BJP-RSS regime,” the Pakistani diplomat said, referring to the recent ‘custodial murder’ of the legendary Father Swamy, a staunch defender of Dalits’ rights in India.
“We, therefore, strongly emphasize that there cannot be and there should not be any place for such a systematic violator of human rights on this Council,” he added.
“One cannot expect anything new from the Hindutva trio of (Prime Minister Narendra) Modi, (Home Minister) Amit Shah and (Chief Minister of UP)Yogi Adiyanath,” the Pakistani diplomat said.
“In today’s incredibly intolerant and fading India, 200 million Muslim minority faces frequent lynching by ‘cow vigilantes’; pogroms by RSS thugs, with official complicity; discriminatory citizenship laws to expel Muslims; and a concerted campaign to destroy mosques and the rich Muslim heritage of India,” he said.
“From Delhi pogrom to Gujarat pogrom, the hands of today’s Indian prime minister are soaked in the blood of innocent Muslims. Just as the victims of Gujarat, the victims of Delhi pogrom still await justice.”
The global human rights constituencies, Suleman said, continue to call India out for its grave violations of Kashmiri rights, noting that letters were sent to the Indian government during the past two years seeking for access to the occupied territory for independent assessment of the ground situation.
But, he said, “India’s response continues to be one of vile attacks and deflection.”
“It is time for India to walk the talk, refrain from peddling falsehood and browbeat those who only show it the mirror,” Suleman added.
