Masood Calls On OIC, African Union To End Apartheid, Genocide In IOJK

Sardar Masood Khan, President of Azad Jammu and Kashmir, has appealed to the leadership of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) and African Union to intervene and stop the ongoing genocide, apartheid and settler-colonialism in the Indian Occupied Jammu and Kashmir (IOJK)

Niamey (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 27th November, 2020) Sardar Masood Khan, President of Azad Jammu and Kashmir, has appealed to the leadership of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) and African Union to intervene and stop the ongoing genocide, apartheid and settler-colonialism in the Indian Occupied Jammu and Kashmir (IOJK).

Upon his arrival in Niamey, the AJK President in his interview to two Niger media networks – Labari TV and New Republic – said that Niger was the founding member of the OIC Contact Group on Jammu and Kashmir and, over the decades, has consistently supported the right to self-determination of the Kashmiri people. The Contact Group, he said, was established on the watch of the then OIC Secretary General Mr. Hamid Algabid who had also remained the Prime Minister and Foreign Secretary of Niger.

“The people of Jammu and Kashmir are grateful to the people and government of Niger for their forthright stand on Kashmir”, he said.

The AJK President said last century scores of African countries after arduous struggles attained freedom and joined the United Nations. “The people of Jammu and Kashmir also started their struggle for freedom and self-determination in 1947 but one big part of the State of Jammu and Kashmir is held in captivity by India”, he said.

Sardar Masood Khan briefed the media networks about the situation in IOJK since August 5, 2019, characterized by military siege, killings, massacres, blindings, enforced disappearances, staged encounters, mass incarcerations and use of rape and sexual molestation as a weapon of war. “Because of a complete communication blackout imposed by India, the territory of occupied Jammu and Kashmir is cut off from the rest of the world. People are cut off from one another. People are prisoners in their homes and neighborhoods; homeless in their own homeland”, he said adding that settler-colonialism is extending its ominous shadow like a rapid moving avalanche in the occupied territory.

“In the past quarter of the year, more than 2 million Hindus from India have been transferred and illegally settled in the occupied territory to change the demographic composition of the occupied State. This is unacceptable to the people of Jammu and Kashmir and this constitutes violation of the UN Security Council resolutions on Kashmir, as well as international law”, said Masood Khan.

The President of Azad Kashmir said that Pakistan and Niger have enjoyed close ties and have worked with each other bilaterally and in multilateral forums.

They have a relationship based on trust which is being further strengthened through mutual cooperation.

The AJK President said that the people of Jammu and Kashmir hoped that Niger would use its influence within the OIC and the African Union to seek justice for the people of Jammu and Kashmir. The African continent, he said, has a responsibility to stop genocide wherever it is taking place in the world. “Last century, the African nations reversed the cycles of apartheid, colonialism and foreign occupation, and later also suffered from the horrendous consequences of genocide in Rwanda and Burundi. Today, the people of Kashmir are victims of systematic genocide and ethnic cleansing”, he said.

The AJK President also the Niger media informed the media that that India continues to carry out unprovoked attacks along the Line of Control against the people of Azad Jammu and Kashmir. Only this year, India has violated the ceasefire agreement 2,700 times. He said that the lives of 600,000 innocent Azad Kashmir citizens are at stake as they are being targeted and their critical infrastructure is being destroyed. Only yesterday an innocent 33 year old Kashmiri was killed on this side of the Line of Control by Indian fire.

Masood Khan said that in addition to its tyranny and terrorism in the IOJK and ceasefire violations along the LOC, it has been sponsoring, financing, supporting and committing acts of terrorism in Pakistan, AJK and Gilgit-Baltistan. These acts of terrorism are being committed by India’s official intelligence agencies, he said. Pakistan has handed over a comprehensive dossier to the UN Secretary General providing irrefutable evidence of Indian acts of terrorism and subversion in AJK, Gilgit-Baltistan and other regions of Pakistan. India has established 87 terrorist training camps – 66 in Afghanistan and 21 in India – to launch terrorist and subversive attacks against Pakistan. The OIC Secretary General should take notice of this onslaught against an OIC and UN member state.

Responding to a question, the President said that the people of Jammu and Kashmir and Pakistan prefer and support a diplomatic solution of the Kashmir dispute. But India, he said, has unleashed military aggression against the people of Jammu and Kashmir, and Pakistan. “This issue must be brought to the UN Security Council and Kashmiris should be given an opportunity to exercise their political will and end this dark night of oppression searing and devastating their lives”, he said.