Islamabad snubs Delhi on UNSC slot win

Pakistan congratulates Ireland, Norway and Mexico on their election to the council

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan has refused to congratulate India on its election as a non-permanent member of the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) for a two-year term starting from January next year.

Islamabad has raised questions on the credentials of India, calling it out as a country involved in gross human rights violations, and its disregard for UN resolutions on the Kashmir dispute.

The United Nations General Assembly on Wednesday elected four countries -- India, Norway, Mexico, and Ireland -- as non-permanent members in the 15-member UNSC.

“We congratulate Ireland, Norway and Mexico on their election to the Council. The election of India, however, raises fundamental questions,” Foreign Office spokesperson Aisha Farooqui said on Thursday.

India received 184 votes out of 193, suggesting an overwhelming support even from the 57-member Organisation of Islamic Countries (OIC).

This prompted Federal Human Rights Minister Shireen Mazari to question the Foreign Office’s performance.

"So India got elected 17 June as non-permanent member of the United Nations Security Council for a two-year term, winning 184 votes in the 193-member General Assembly. Ireland, Mexico & Norway also won their regional seats in UNSC," she wrote on Twitter.

"Question for Pakistan is why we ensured no one else from region contested? There was a contest on the African seat. Why did we agree to Indian nomination made much earlier?” Mazari asked. “What is very disturbing is the number of votes India managed to get!"

The minister further wrote that it was not about "heavens won't fall". “it's the fact that at a time when India has illegally annexed IOJ&K [Indian Occupied Jammu and Kashmir] and is attacking Pakistan daily alongside its ongoing active conflicts with China & Nepal, by letting India win the vote uncontested gives its actions a quasi pol legitimacy," she maintained.

Mazari later clarified that the Indian candidature for UNSC was not endorsed by the PTI government but was done in 2013 when the PPP was in power.

The minister, perhaps, was unaware of the processes involved in the UNSC election. In 2013, India had announced its candidature for the 2021-22 seat from the Asia Pacific region.

Its candidature was endorsed in June 2019, when PTI was in power, by the Asia Pacific region. Pakistan is part of the group, which endorsed Indian nomination.

But a Foreign Office official explained that India was a sole candidate so the question of endorsement was a mere formality. “Pakistan has also received such endorsements from the group in the past,” the official added.

However, Pakistan has decided to give India a tough time when it begins its two-year term.

The Foreign Office spokesperson, during her weekly media briefing, listed a number of reasons as to why Islamabad held that New Delhi did not deserve to be a member of the UNSC.

She said the UN Charter had entrusted the Security Council with the primary responsibility of maintaining international peace and security.

“The Charter stipulates that in discharging this responsibility, on behalf of the member states, the Council shall act in accordance with the purposes and principles of the United Nations. This is the touchstone for the Council’s credibility and legitimacy,” said Aisha.

“India stands in flagrant violation of several resolutions of the Security Council that prescribed a UN-supervised plebiscite to enable the people of Jammu and Kashmir to exercise their fundamental right to self-determination,” she added.

The spokesperson maintained that India’s gross and systematic violations of human rights in IOJ&K had been extensively documented by international human rights and humanitarian organisations, as well as the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, in successive reports.

“India has incarcerated eight million Kashmiris, including top Kashmiri leadership, and has deployed 900,000 occupation troops in the disputed region,” she pointed out.

“The people of IOJ&K have been suffering under an inhumane lockdown and military siege for over 10 months, following India’s illegal and unilateral actions on August 5, 2019, [wherein India revoked Kashmir’s special status].”

Aisha noted that the entire region had been turned into a ‘large prison with unprecedented restrictions,’ which continued despite the ongoing coronavirus pandemic.

She further highlighted that India had persistently defied requests to allow international monitors in IOJ&K.

“Indian actions aimed at illegally altering the demographic structure of IOJ&K are in violation of multiple UN Security Council resolutions and international law, in particular the 4th Geneva Convention.”

The spokesperson further said as the world grappled with the unprecedented Covid-19 pandemic, India was busy, unabashedly, advancing the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh-Bharatiya Janata Party (RSS-BJP) inspired extremist ‘Hindutva’ ideology’.

India’s continued human rights violations against its minorities, Muslims in particular, such as the threat to render them stateless, the imposition of the discriminatory Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), initiation of the National Register of Citizens (NRC) process, targeted killings during repeated riots against Muslims – Mumbai in 1993, Gujarat in 2002, New Delhi in 2020, among others, – were all cited as examples, while the destruction of Babri Masjid was also brought up as an indication of rising Islamophobia in India.

“The Indian state’s proclivity to violence is no secret, which is a direct consequence of its headlong militarisation and unbridled hegemonic ambitions,” Aisha pointed out.

She said India had routinely used aggression in seeking to coerce its neighbours. “It has employed terrorism, at one time or another, as state policy to destabilise every neighbouring state, she insisted, adding that the country has border disputes with all of its neighbours.”

The spokesperson said India’s so-called ‘5-S approach’ in the UNSC was only a “smoke-screen to mask the arrogant, belligerent and confrontationist side of India”.

“Perhaps India would do well to consider another “S” i.e. Satya or truth: The truth of Indian oppression, aggression and occupation, which cannot be covered up by false espousal,” she added.

The spokesperson maintained that Indian actions in IOJ&K, and beyond, were a fundamental negation of the purposes and principles of the UN Charter.

She reiterated that India was a consistent violator of the UN Security Council resolutions on Jammu and Kashmir dispute. “Rather than felicitated, a country with such credentials must be held accountable,” she insisted.

“India must be asked to abide by the resolutions of the Security Council. Pakistan will be working with rest of the members of the Security Council in advancing the objectives of international peace and security in South Asia and beyond.”