British investigators expose India’s war crimes in IIOJK

SWI reports says 450 incidents of violence occurred in occupied territory

ISLAMABAD:

The Stoke White Investigations (SWI) said in a report, released on Wednesday, that there were 450 incidents of violence in Indian Illegally Occupied Jammu and Kashmir in 2020-21, exposing Indian brutalities and war crimes against the Kashmiri people.

The report, titled ‘India Silencing Journalism and Human Rights in Kashmir’ also said that there were 100 of enforced disappearances in IIOJK besides 30 cases of sexual violence and 1,500 cases of pellet guns were reported.

The Legal Forum for Kashmir (LFK) and the Britain-based investigating unit, the SWI issued a report on human rights violations in IIOJK for documenting the Indian war crimes at the Islamabad Press Club. It also released dossier on India’s treatment of Kashmiri journalists and human rights defenders in IIOJK.

Speaking on the occasion, Senator Mushahid Hussain Sayed said that the investigative report drew the world attention towards India's strategy of silencing journalists and human rights defenders in the IIOJK. He added that the report also mentions names of officers responsible for the harassment and detention of journalists and human rights defenders.

“The effort of the LFK and the SWI unit to document the war crimes committed by the Indian authorities is commendable, Sayed said. “Indian massacres in occupied Kashmir are similar to Israel’s illegal actions against the Palestinians,” he added.

He pointed out that despite being a peaceful activist, Kashmiri human rights activist Khurram Pervez was falsely accused of stoking terrorism, adding that the only crime of Pervez was to speak the truth against the occupation forces.

“Whatever is happening in occupied Kashmir in the 21st century is the Indian version of the Gestapo [the official secret police of Nazi Germany and in German-occupied Europe during the World War II], which brutalises and silences any voice that speaks the truth,” he added.

Prominent Kashmiri Hurriyat leader Mashaal Mullick, on the occasion, praised the joint report on Indian abuses against journalists and human rights defenders. Describing India as the devil of the present time, she said that all human rights violations of India in IIOJK should be documented.

Mullick requested the Pakistani media to focus on research and evidence-based documentation of human rights violations in IIOJK. “Kashmiri journalists and human rights defenders are being intimidated and arbitrarily detained under black colonial laws,” she said.