ISLAMABAD: Shabbir Ahmad Shah, an imprisoned senior leader of the All Parties Hurriyat Conference, has expressed grave concern over the deteriorating human rights and political situation in Indian illegally-occupied Jammu and Kashmir (IIOJK) and claimed that the Narendra Modi-led Indian government is persecuting Kashmiris for claiming their birthright to self-determination.
Kashmir Media Service reported the message of Shabbir Ahmad Shah from New Delhi’s Tihar Jail, referring to the rising incidents of arrests, raids, seizure of properties, cordon and search operations, and other brutalities in the region he said the Modi regime is trying to mute the legitimate political voices of the Kashmiri people through such brutalities.
He added that the Kashmiri activists and Hurriyat leaders are being detained for their political views, adding that leaders demanding freedom have been implicated in fabricated cases to discredit them.
He noted that the Modi government was using its dreaded investigation agencies like National Investigation Agency (NIA) as a weapon to involve people of Kashmir in false cases to mute their voice demanding freedom.
Shabbir Shah cited the most recent instance as the NIA’s request that JKLF leader Muhammad Yasin Malik’s life sentence be changed to the death punishment in a petition to the Delhi High Court. He argued that Yasin Malik’s conviction by an Indian court following a mock trial last year was political revenge.
He continued by saying that when it comes to convicting the freedom-loving citizens of IIOJK, the Indian judicial system disregards all norms of justice and the rule of law. He advised Modi to remember that leaders could not be imprisoned or executed to silence legitimate political opinions.
The detained APHC chief stated that the biased Indian courts’ wrongful prosecutions of Kashmiri Hurriyat leaders and activists must be taken seriously by international human rights organizations. The Kashmiri people’s desire for a lasting peace in South Asia was also emphasized, and he asked the international community to assist in a peaceful resolution of the Kashmir dispute under the pertinent UN Security Council resolutions. — APP
