Sartaj gives scathing rejoinder to Sushma

Only Kashmiris, not India, can decide their fate, says PM’s aide

ISLAMABAD/ LAHORE: Pakistan’s top foreign policy wizard has rebuked India’s External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj for her statement in which she said Islamabad’s dream of Kashmir becoming its part would never turn into a reality.

“Such a verdict on the future of Kashmir can only be given by the people of Kashmir and not by the external affairs minister of India,” he said on Sunday in a scathing rejoinder to Sushma Swaraj’s remarks.

Sushma said on Saturday that Pakistan had a dangerous dream that one day Kashmir would become a part of it.  “It will never come to reality,” she said insisting that “Jammu and Kashmir is India’s integral part [and] Pakistan will never be able to make it a terror-hell for Kashmiris.”



However, Aziz contested her assertions and made it clear that the future of Kashmir would be decided by its people, and this right was promised to them by the UN Security Council.

“It is high time that India allowed the people of Jammu and Kashmir to exercise this right through a free and fair UN supervised plebiscite. Once the majority of the people of Kashmir have voted for joining either Pakistan or India the whole world will accept this verdict of the Kashmiri people,” he said in a statement.

The Indian foreign minister also objected to the statement issued by Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif in which he called Burhan Wani a ‘martyr.’

Aziz reminded his Indian counterpart that tens of thousands of people attended Wani’s funeral which showed he was not a terrorist but a freedom fighter.

“Here again, India cannot ignore the fact that over 200,000 Kashmiris participated in the funeral prayers of Burhan Muzaffar Wani in 50 different locations throughout Indian Occupied Kashmir despite strict curfew clamped in the valley, which continues 15 days after Wani’s extrajudicial murder on July 8, 2016,” Aziz said in the statement.

“Let us not forget, as one Indian writer has reminded us, that not long ago the British labelled Indian freedom fighters as traitors and terrorists because at that time India was considered an integral part of the British Empire.”

Despite Indian objection, Aziz made it clear that the government and the people of Pakistan remain firmly committed in their moral, diplomatic and political support to the Kashmiris’ indigenous movement for self-determination and resolution of the Kashmir dispute in accordance with the relevant UN Security Council resolutions.

“Pakistan urges the UN, international community and human rights organisations to play their role in stopping Indian atrocities in Indian Occupied Kashmir against innocent and defenseless Kashmiris. Even in India, conscientious voices have raised concern over the brutalities and reign of terror unleashed by Indian forces in IOK.”

The two nuclear armed neighbors have been engaged in a war of words ever since the violence broke out in Kashmir following the death of Wani in a police encounter. Around 50 people have been killed and thousands of others wounded so far in police firing in the disputed region of Kashmir.

Pakistan has launched a diplomatic push to expose what it calls the grave human rights violation being committed by the Indian forces in the held territory. It also urged the UN Human Rights Council to send a fact finding mission to the Indian held Kashmir in order to investigate the ongoing violence in the valley.

A senior Foreign Office official, when contacted, however, expressed his disappointment over the ‘apathy’ of powerful Western countries towards the plight of innocent Kashmiris.  “They [Western countries] are champions of human rights and freedom but their silence on Kashmir situation speaks volumes about their double standards,” lamented the official, who wished not to be named.

Published in The Express Tribune, July 25^th, 2016.