‘Unprovoked’ shelling: Pakistan draws UN attention to Indian aggression

Maleeha Lodhi writes letter to UN Security Council

UNITED NATIONS:

Pakistan has urged the United Nations Security Council to take notice of the escalating incidents of firing by Indian troops across the Line of Control (LoC) in the disputed Himalayan territory of Kashmir  and the working boundary (WB) in which a large number of civilians have been killed and injured.

In a letter addressed to the council’s president, Ambassador Vitaly Churkin of Russia, Pakistan’s permanent representative in the UN Maleeha Lodhi said the world body should press India to abide by the 2003 ceasefire agreement. In doing so, Ambassador Lodhi has taken the issue of India’s ‘provocative’ actions to the highest levels of the UN.



In her letter, the Pakistani envoy gave details of the breaches of the ceasefire by India and pointed out that there had been a spike in such violence over the last couple of months. These violations have involved the use of small arms, as well as heavy mortar fire, and have targeted innocent civilians, including women and children, she said. She requested the Russian envoy to circulate the letter as an official document of the Security Council.

According to a statement released by Pakistan’s UN mission, Indian security forces violated the ceasefire 36 times in July this year, killing five civilians and injuring six others. The number spiked significantly in August, the statement said, with some 20 civilians killed and 97 other wounded in 90 ceasefire violations by India.



Over the past several weeks, Pakistan has been raising the issue of violations by India along the LoC and WB at the UN with top officials in the Departments of Political Affairs and Peacekeeping Operations. In this connection, Lodhi briefed the senior UN leadership, including Deputy Secretary General Jan Eliasson, about India’s provocative actions deliberately targeting the civilian population and called for the UN Military Observers Group in India and Pakistan (UNMOGIP) to investigate these violations.

In her meeting with Eliasson, she had informed him of India’s rejection of dialogue by setting pre-conditions for the first-ever official talks between the national security advisers of the two countries, which led to the cancellation of the meeting. India had cancelled the foreign secretary-level talks last year in similar fashion.

Lodhi told Eliasson that Pakistan remains committed to a peaceful resolution of all outstanding issues Pakistan has on many occasions highlighted its concerns pertaining to ongoing ceasefire violations.

Earlier this week, Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif warned India not to mistake Pakistan’s silence on the neighbouring country’s ceasefire violations as a sign of weakness. “Our patience on India’s ceasefire violations must not be taken as a sign of weakness,” he had said.

Last month, Foreign Secretary Aizaz Ahmad Chaudhry summoned India’s High Commissioner in Pakistan Dr TCA Raghavan and lodged a protest over unprovoked firing from Indian forces in the Harpal and Chaprar that left six civilians dead and 47, including 22 women, injured.


Published in The Express Tribune, September 6^th, 2015.