British MPs express concern over humanitarian crisis in IIOJK

The High Commission for Pakistan in London on Thursday organised a seminar for Kashmir Black Day, which is observed every year on October 27 to mark India’s forcible occupation of Jammu and Kashmir on the day in 1947.

High Commissioner (HC) Moazzam Ahmad Khan presided over the event which was addressed virtually and in-person by several cross-party British Parliamentarians including Debbie Abrahams MP Chairperson APPG on Kashmir, Lord Wajid Khan, and MPs Yasmin Qureshi, Afzal Khan and Naz Shah.

MPs Paul Bristow, Khalid Mehmood, James Daly, Steve Baker and Sarah Owen sent their messages of solidarity for Kashmiris. Additonally, Raja Najabat Hussain, Dr Nazir Gilani, Victoria Schofield, Councillor Liaquat Ali MBE, Councillor Asim Rashid, Councillor Tamoor Tariq, Shaista Safi, Dr Ghulam Nabi Mir and Dr Imran H. Khan Suddahzai also addressed the seminar. Kashmiri leaders, academia, legal fraternity, human rights activists, British friends of Kashmir and media persons also attended the seminar.

In his remarks, the high commissioner highlighted the oppression and brutalisation of the innocent Kashmiri people by the Indian occupation forces. He added that since August 5, 2019, over eight million people of the occupied valley had been subjected by India to the most inhuman military siege in recent history. He stated that torture, enforced disappearances, violation of the sanctity of home and person, extra-judicial killings, and unspeakable crimes like rape had become rampant in Indian Illegally Occupied Jammu and Kashmir (IIOJK).

The HC said since 1947, more than 400,000 Kashmiris had been massacred, 8,652 mass graves uncovered, in addition to 3,850 reported incidents of rape and molestations of Kashmiri women and children since 2014. He also apprised the participants of the recently released 150-page dossier portraying details of human rights abuses committed by Indian occupation forces in IIOJK.