Pakistan urges UNSC to fulfill commitment on Kashmir

By Islamuddin Sajid

ISLAMABAD (AA) – Pakistan’s prime minister Thursday urged the United Nations to fulfill its commitment and implement its own resolutions on Kashmir dispute in a message marking the United Nations Day.

The message, issued by the office of Imran Khan, quoted the premier as saying: "One of the oldest issues on the agenda of the United Nations Security Council [UNSC], situation in IOJ&K [Indian Occupied Jammu and Kashmir] serves as an ignominious reminder of a brutal and oppressive occupation that has already lasted a lifetime.”

Kashmiri people are still waiting for the international community to fulfill its promise to provide them with the opportunity to freely exercise their inalienable right to self-determination, Khan said.

Stressing the UN role in the struggle against colonialism and the protection and promotion of fundamental human rights, Khan said Pakistan is proud to have played its part in upholding the noble ideals espoused by the UN.

"Universal ideals of the Charter continue to be violated in plain sight of the international community across many parts of the world -- nowhere more egregiously than in Indian occupied Jammu and Kashmir," read his message.

The Kashmir dispute is the oldest unresolved international conflict on the UNSC agenda since 1948. India and Pakistan both hold Kashmir in parts and claim it in full. China also controls part of the contested region, but it is India and Pakistan who have fought two wars over Kashmir.

Khan said the United Nations Day serves as a reminder for us to collectively reaffirm our support to the purposes and principles of the UN Charter.

Oct. 24, 1945 was when the UN Charter came into force and has been celebrated annually as United Nations Day since 1948.

He assured that Pakistan will always stand by the UN in their common quest to leave no one behind.

The India-administered Jammu and Kashmir has been under a near-complete lockdown since New Delhi’s move on Aug. 5 to scrap the special status of the region previously codified in the Indian Constitution's Article 370, which allowed it to enact its own laws.

The provisions also protected the region's citizenship law, which barred outsiders from settling in and owning land in the territory.

Several rights groups including Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International have repeatedly called on India to lift restrictions and release political detainees.

India has maintained that 93% of the restrictions have been eased in the conflict-ridden region, a claim Anadolu Agency could not independently verify.