ISLAMABAD (National Times)- Pakistan on Tuesday said that Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s remarks about resolving the Kashmir issue are false and misleading amd they also reflect how oblivious the Indian leadership has become of the ground realities in Illegally Occupied Jammu & Kashmir (IIOJK).
The Foreign Office, in a statement issued on Tuesday, categorically rejected the Indian premier’s remarks about IIOJK while addressing a public rally in Gujarat.
Modi claimed that he was able to resolve the long-pending Kashmir issue as he is walking in the footsteps of India’s first home minister Sardar Patel, The Hindu reported.
However, FO called on India to ensure that the people of Kashmir are accorded their inalienable right to self-determination, while demanding that the Indian leadership, instead of making “delusional” statements about having resolved the Kashmir issue, must deliver on their commitments.
The FO said that Jammu and Kashmir is an internationally recognised dispute, the resolution of which has been on the agenda of the United Nations since 1948.
It reiterated that India has illegally occupied the territory and is guilty of egregious human rights violations employing over 900,000 brutal occupation forces despite clear UN resolutions that prescribe a free and impartial plebiscite for the final disposition of the dispute.
The statement said that Pakistan has consistently called upon the international community to assume its role and responsibility with regard to IIOJK and the ongoing Indian atrocities in the occupied territory.
It added that India must also be held responsible for its nefarious scheme of altering the demography of IIOJK and for its brutal repression of the innocent Kashmiris.
Retreating its call on human rights and humanitarian organisations to condemn India’s state terrorism in IIOJK, Pakistan demanded an immediate reversal of the Indian government’s illegal and unilateral actions of 5 August 2019.
FO said that India’s craftily staged visits to the occupied territory choreographed launches of so-called development projects in a bid to create a facade of “normalcy” will neither dampen the spirit of the Kashmiris nor would it deceive the world into believing India’s deception.
At its conclusion, the FO said that the only solution to the Jammu and Kashmir dispute lies in ensuring that the Kashmiris are allowed to exercise their right of self-determination through the democratic method of holding UN-mandated free and impartial plebiscite as espoused in the relevant UNSC resolutions and as per the wishes of the Kashmiri people.
