Russell Tribunal: Global forum highlights IIOJK genocide, rights abuses

Panelists bring forth the Modi-led govt's tactics to brush the situation under the carpet

The situation in Indian Illegally Occupied Jammu and Kashmir (IIOJK) has reached the threshold of genocide amidst the total defencelessness of the victims, with the Hindutva-inspired actions prevailing with impunity.

This was the observation at the Russell Tribunal on Kashmir, organised jointly with leading human rights organisations and academics hailing Kashmir, Bosnia, and Italy, TRT World reported in its report on the forum on Wednesday.

The session took place in Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina on December 17-19 2021, designed to shed light on war crimes and crimes against humanity committed by India in IIOJK. The choice of Sarajevo was crucial in the sense that it was itself the scene of genocide in the 1990s.

The tribunal involved 15 international judges, including renowned US Islamic scholar Omar Suleiman, it said.

Also read: British MPs ‘alarmed’ over IIOJK abuses

Associate professor at Georgetown University’s Edmund A Walsh School of Foreign Service Jonathan AC Brown, Director of Research at Institute for Social Policy and Understanding in Washington, Dalia Mujahid were among the judges on the occasion.

The report added that the Managing Editor of Middle East Eye and former chief writer of The Guardian David Hearst and Bosnian author Hasan Nuhanovic, a survivor of the 1995 Srebrenica massacre participated in the proceedings.

It said that several witnesses from IIOJK participated in the event as experts cited reports by human rights organisations, such as Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, studying previously conducted interviews with the survivors.

The discussions laid focus on four key areas: genocide, decolonisation, settler colonialism, and crimes against humanity.

The participants observed that "mass murder, excessive use of force, mass displacement, demographic re-engineering, forced disappearances, torture, mass rape, dispossession, home demolition, destruction of cultural heritage, restriction on all freedoms were all being committed within a climate of impunity."

Also read: Pakistan condemns extrajudicial killing of two Kashmiris in IIOJK

According to the experts, the situation has reached the threshold of genocide, keeping in view the "total defencelessness of the victims".

All the while, the attendees noted, that the Narendra Modi government in India manoeuvres to brush the IIOJK situation under the carpet, using various PR tactics in order to divert attention from it.

They deemed the projecting of human rights criticism as pro-Pakistani conspiracy and hiding atrocities by the occupation forces under the counter-terrorism mantra as some of the most common stratagems in the given context.

The panellists and other participants also observed that the Modi-led government chooses to impose a complete blackout on the grave situation by blocking international journalists and rights activists from even making a visit to the occupied territory.

The findings will help expose Kashmir's genocide and shatter the myths projecting India as the world's largest democracy.

Also read: EU closely monitoring IIOJK’s human rights situation: VP

In fact, the panellists noted, the testimonies and evidence brought forth unveil an "increasingly rogue behaviour" that puts aside all basic principles of public morality and global law.

Among the common stratagems in this context are depicting human rights criticism as pro-Pakistani conspiracy and concealing the atrocities under the mantra of counterterrorism. Moreover, the Modi government imposes a total blackout on the situation, blocking foreign journalists and international human rights experts from even visiting Jammu and Kashmir.

Concluding, the report stated: "Staying silent only emboldens extremist-led governments, which benefit from the general apathy to produce even more horrific acts of violence."

The Russell Tribunal was a concept introduced by the British philosopher Bertrand Russell (1872-1970) to bring forth grassroots justice with the basic aim to spread awareness and stir global opinion against war crimes and other blatant violations of international law.