UNITED NATIONS
A United Nations human rights expert has accused the Indian government of tacitly allowing incitement to violence against Muslims in a report that documents the state-driven and tolerated hatred, discrimination and violence against minorities in India.
The UN Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Religion or Belief, Ahmad Shaheed, who presented the report to the Geneva-based UN Human Rights Council on Thursday, also denounced the wide-ranging Indian atrocities in occupied Jammu and Kashmir.
Stung by the damning report on ‘rights of religious or belief minorities in situations of insecurity and conflict’, India rejected the UN expert’s findings, without offering any substantive arguments.
On his part, Pakistan’s Permanent Representative to the UN Offices in Geneva, Ambassador Khalil Hashmi, echoed the report’s references about human rights situation in Indian Occupied Kashmir and called on the UN expert to continue monitoring and reporting on the situation, especially the Kashmiri people’s inalienable right to self-determination. .
In his report, Special Rapporteur Shaheed said that the Indian authorities had failed to address impunity for human rights violations in Kashmir – including extra-judicial killings, enforced disappearances and rape – and have enacted special laws to impede accountability and obstruct victims’ access to remedies.
In fact, he wrote that India had increased restrictions on movements of the predominantly Muslim Kashmiri population, already under strict lockdown since the 2019 revocation of Kashmir’s special autonomous status, and sent more troops.
“These measures, combined with Internet shutdowns, have hampered Kashmiris’ ability to protect themselves from the virus or receive outside help,” the special rapporteur said.
