APPENDIX 8
Memorandum submitted by Mr Sultan Mahmood
Chaudhry, Prime Minister, Azad Jammu and Kashmir
I have been informed that the Foreign Affairs
Committee of the British House of Commons is due to hold an "Evidence
Session" concerning the Human Rights Annual Report on Tuesday,
23 November 1999. And the main witness before the Committee on
that day will be Mr Peter Hain, Minister of State at the Foreign
and Commonwealth Office whose ministerial responsibilities include
the State of Jammu and Kashmir.
2. In my capacity as the elected Prime Minister
of the Azad Government of the State of Jammu and Kashmir (AJK)
representing three million State nationals living in AJK and 1.2
million refugees from Indian occupied part of the State of Jammu
and Kashmir, residing in Pakistan, I have the privilege to submit
before the Committee facts on the human rights situation in the
Indian occupied Jammu and Kashmir, and also make some suggestions.
3. Before making a submission on the subject,
let me very briefly apprise the Committee about the Governmental
structure in Azad Jammu and Kashmir.
(i) AJK Government owes its existence to
the Azad Jammu and Kashmir Interim Constitution Act 1974 which
replaced the Acts 1960, 1964 and 1970.
(ii) The present Act provides for a Parliamentary
form of Government, with the following features—
(a) A Legislative Assembly comprising 40
members directly elected on adult franchise and eight indirectly
elected members. While 28 members are elected by the residents
of Azad Jammu and Kashmir, 12 represent the refugees from the
State residing in Pakistan, eight indirectly elected members (elected
by 40 elected members) include five women, one technocrat, one
religious scholar and one representative of the Overseas Kashmiris.
The term of the Assembly is five years.
(b) Elections to the Legislative Assembly are
contested on the tickets of political parties as well as independents.
The member commanding majority in the House is elected as the
Prime Minister, who is the Chief Executive. The undersigned has
the support of 39 of the 48 members of the Legislative Assembly;
all belonging to "Peoples Party AJK". Undersigned took
oath of office in August 1996.
(c) The President, who is the Constitutional
Head and acts on the advice of the Prime Minister, is elected
by the Legislature for a term of five years. However, he acts
independently in matters pertaining to the appointment of Superior
Judiciary, Public Service Commission, Ombudsman and Chief Election
Commissioner.
(d) There is a Supreme Court and a High Court;
the judges are appointed by the President for a fixed tenure.
(e) Except for Foreign Affairs, Defence and
Currency, which are the responsibility of Pakistan under UNCIP
Resolution, full legislative and executive powers are respectively
vested in the AJK Legislative Assembly and the Government.
4.
(a) The Government of Azad Jammu and
Kashmir, remains in very close touch with the events and happenings
in the Indian occupied Jammu and Kashmir. It maintains personal
contacts with the genuine political leadership and other prominent
figures in the occupied territory, by telephone, correspondence,
through emissaries and occasional personal meetings in third countries.
(b) Kashmiris from across the Line of Control
have, in large numbers, been periodically forced to flee to AJK.
Though, with the sealing of the Line of Control by the Indian
Armed Forces, the influx of refugees has reduced greatly but has
by no means stopped.
(c) AJK Government have sponsored/assisted/encouraged
visits of scores of delegations/individuals representing international
human rights organisations, media, parliaments, jurists, diplomats,
officials of international agencies, to AJK and to Indian occupied
Kashmir during the past several years. These included representatives
of Amnesty International, International Federation of Human Rights,
International Red Cross, International Commission of Jurists,
members of the British and Norwegian Parliament and US Senators.
The AJK Government have therefore access to uptodate and authentic
information about the human rights situation in the Indian occupied
Jammu and Kashmir.
5. Cognizant of the fact that the members
of the Committee will have much material to read, I am avoiding
details and references and very briefly submit the following facts
about the very grave and serious human rights situation in the
Indian occupied Jammu and Kashmir:
(i) Though the situation in IHK (Indian Held
Kashmir) has been simmering for the last five decades and the
Indian occupation army used brute force against Kashmiris repeatedly
in 1948, 1953-54, 1964-65, but never as systematically and massively
as they have done in the past 10 years. The "Security Forces"
brutality is solely responsible for provoking and alienating the
entire populace of Jammu and Kashmir, the Kashmir Valley in particular.
The people increasingly feel that their "freedom and identity"
can only be established if they throw off the yoke of Indian subjugation.
Thus a peoples movement against Indian rule in the State has gained
momentum and each passing day brings reports of the killings of
militants and civilians in clashes with the "Security Forces".
(ii) The Kashmir dispute during seventies
and early eighties was sucked into the cold war and frozen there,
"leaving Kashmir in a state of hopelessness with no prospect
of a thaw in sight. This condition changed not because of any
"wave of Islamic militancy" but because of the wave
of freedom which swept the globe in the late 1980's. Many captive
people became free. Two situations particularly impressed themselves
on the Kashmiris consciousness. The first was Namibia where the
UN demonstrated the ability to manage a referendum and bring the
people to independence after 70 years of alien rule. The second
was Afghanistan where it was shown that resistance to a power
even more formidable than India is not fruitless. This change
of consciousness directly resulted in the current uprising in
Kashmir.
(iii) The uprising has been met by repression
of a severity that no other people in the whole region has had
to suffer and that not even the erstwhile colonial ruler in the
darkest days of colonialism permitted itself to employ.
(iv) Regardless of India's ability to maintain
its occupation of Kashmir, one thing has emerged very clearly
that it will never be able to administer Kashmir for one day in
any civilised sense of the term "administer", far less
to run a democracy there.
6. (i) There are no less than six hundred
thousand Indian Military and para-military troops stationed in
the State today. Not more than one sixth of those are facing the
Pakistani Army on the Line of Control, the bulk is deployed in
and around population centres. The ratio is one soldier to every
three Kashmiri families. This is perhaps the highest ever concentration
of an army in a civilian area. The troops are in front of schools,
hospitals and places of worship. They are in the midst of bazaars
and shopping centres. The people of Kashmir are under a siege
in their own country.
(ii) India does not allow International media,
international human rights organisations, third country parliamentary
and other delegations free access to Kashmir. Those few who have
managed to visit Kashmir have not been allowed to move freely.
(iii) India seldom allows genuine Kashmiri
political leadership to travel outside India despite invitations
from international agencies.
(iv) Most of the Kashmiri political leadership
has, time and again, been detained.
(v) Draconian laws eg, Armed Forces (J&K)
Special Powers Act, Jammu and Kashmir Public Safety Act, National
Security Act, Prevention and Suppression of Sabotage Act are in
force in Indian Occupied Kashmir.
(vi) There are a very large number of writs
of "habeas corpus" pending in the J&K High Court
for years without any action.
7. Though it is difficult to keep an exact
account but, on the basis of the reports of notable human rights
organisations and international press, statistics of the atrocities
committed by the Indian occupation forces on the Kashmiri civilians
since 1989 are as follows:
| Killed | Over 65,000
|
| Missing (or killed in custody) | Over 93,000
|
| Burnt alive | 491 |
| Dead bodies recovered from River Jhelum |
617 |
| Seriously wounded | Over 36,000
|
| Disabled | Over 39,000 |
| Women raped (Age 7-70) | Over 15,000
|
| Men sexually incapacitated through torture |
7,726 |
| Houses burnt | 11,082 |
| Shops burnt | 7,023 |
| Forced to leave home | Over 49,000
|
8. (i) A report released in November 1997 by an Indian
civil rights group noted that average monthly killings by the
Indian armed forces in the State were about 125.
(ii) The Human Rights Watch in its report for the year
1997-98 observed that military operations against insurgent groups
in IHK (and India's Northeast) resulted in many of the worst abuses
by Indian forces, including extra-judicial executions, torture,
rape and other abuses of serious nature.
(iii) The Amnesty International, in its annual report
for the year 1998, observed that during the year, thousands of
political prisoners, including prisoners of conscience and APHC
leaders were subjected to arbitrary detention and harassment.
Hundreds of extra-judicial executions were reported. Torture and
ill-treatment were endemic, leading to at least 300 deaths in
custody.
(iv) According to the US State Department's Report 1998,
impunity has been and remains a serious problem in Jammu and Kashmir.
The security forces have committed thousands of serious human
rights violations, including extra-judicial killings, disappearances
and torture.
(v) The Human Rights Watch World Report 1999 cites increased
instances of human rights violations by the Indian occupation
forces in IHK since the Hindu nationalist BJP came into power
in February 1998.
(vi) On 2 March 1999, Amnesty International released a
news report highlighting hundreds of unsolved "disappearances"
in Jammu and Kashmir. According to the report, up to 800 people
have "disappeared" since 1990. The included ordinary
citizens picked up at random, with no connection to the armed
struggle.
9. As a first step to peacefully resolve the long-standing
Kashmir dispute in accordance with the wishes of the people of
Jammu and Kashmir, it is necessary to cease forthwith human rights
violations of the Kashmiri people. I call upon the Government
of United Kingdom to use its influence and persuade India to:
(a) End suppression and the massive violations of the
human right of the Kashmiri people in the State of Jammu and Kashmir.
(b) Allow leadership of the All Parties Hurriyat Conference
in Jammu and Kashmir to freely travel outside India.
(c) Allow free access into Jammu and Kashmir of International
media, international human rights organisations and third country
parliamentary delegations.
(d) Government of UK may facilitate a meeting of the political
leadership of Jammu and Kashmir representing all religious, political
and ethnic groups from both sides of the Line of Control, to be
held in a third country.
(e) Government of UK may persuade India to withdraw armed
forces from population centres.
(f) Government of UK may designate a special envoy on
Jammu and Kashmir to monitor the Human Rights situation.
Sultan Mahmood Chaudhry
|
