{"id":17441,"date":"2018-07-17T11:53:36","date_gmt":"2018-07-17T06:53:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/jworldtimes.com\/old-site\/jwt2015\/?p=17441"},"modified":"2018-07-17T11:53:36","modified_gmt":"2018-07-17T06:53:36","slug":"human-rights-and-peace-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.jworldtimes.com\/old-site\/studykit\/currentaffairs\/daily-articles\/human-rights-and-peace-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Human rights and peace"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Human<\/a><\/p>\n

A WEEK ago, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights issued the first-ever report on human rights in Kashmir. \u201cThis is not a conflict frozen in time,\u201d said the UNHCHR head. \u201cIt is a conflict that has robbed millions of their basic human rights and continues to inflict untold suffering.\u201d The report has urged the UN Human Rights Council \u201cto consider establishing a Commission of Inquiry to conduct a comprehensive and independent international investigation into allegations of human rights violations in Kashmir\u201d.<\/p>\n

The report was prepared through \u201cremote monitoring\u201d since India refused to accept an on-site visit by the UN high commissioner\u2019s office to India-held Kashmir and Pakistan made its acceptance of access to Azad Jammu & Kashmir conditional on India\u2019s acceptance. The report, obviously to project objectivity and impartiality, creates a false equivalence between the human rights \u2018developments\u2019 in IHK and human rights \u2018concerns\u2019 in AJK and Gilgit-Baltistan. Further, to soften the blow for India, the historical review of the dispute is partial; it refers to \u201cthe Indian state\u201d of Jammu and Kashmir and omits reference to India\u2019s refusal to implement the Security Council\u2019s plebiscite resolutions.<\/p>\n

Nevertheless, the 49-page report devotes over 20 pages to the violations in IHK and five pages to alleged \u2018concerns\u2019 in \u201cPakistan-administered Kashmir\u201d which, the report admits, are of a \u201cdifferent magnitude\u201d, and mostly \u201cstructural\u201d.<\/p>\n

The report\u2019s section on \u2018Human rights violations in Indian-administered Kashmir\u2019 covers: lack of access to justice; military courts; administrative detentions; excessive use of force; killings perpetrated in 2018; use of pellet shotguns; arbitrary arrests; torture; enforced disappearances; violations of the rights to health, education and freedom of expression; reprisals against human rights defenders and journalists; and sexual violence.<\/p>\n

How can the first UN report on human rights in Kashmir be utilised to alleviate the people\u2019s suffering?<\/p>\n

The report notes that this \u201cround\u201d of protests, which started after Burhan Wani\u2019s killing on July 8, 2016, is \u201con an unprecedented scale\u201d and \u201cinvolve(s) more people\u201d mostly more \u201cyoung, middle-class Kashmiris including females\u201d. Since July 2016, 145 Kashmiris have been killed by the Indian security forces. The use of pellet shotguns killed 17 people and injured 6,221 between July 2016 to August 2017. The impunity for human rights violations and lack of access to justice (provided largely by the Special Powers Act and the Public Safety Act) are \u201ckey human rights challenges\u201d. There is \u201ctotal impunity for enforced and involuntary disappearances\u201d and \u201cchronic impunity for sexual violence\u201d. Attempts to seek justice for the gang rape 27 years ago of 23 Kashmiri women by Indian soldiers at Kunan-Poshpura \u201chas been blocked … at different levels\u201d.<\/p>\n

The false equivalence between IHK and AJK, the reference to the \u201cIndian state\u201d of Jammu and Kashmir and the skewed historical review make it impossible for Pakistan to endorse the report in its entirety. Nevertheless, Islamabad must examine how this first UN report on human rights in Kashmir can be utilised to alleviate the cruel suffering of the Kashmiri people and the danger of another war between Pakistan and India.<\/p>\n

Pakistan\u2019s capacity to support the freedom struggle of the Kashmiri people has been significantly compromised by India\u2019s success in equating it with \u2018Islamist terrorism\u2019 as well as US pressure to refrain from doing so. Yet, despite this, India\u2019s half-a-million-man army in IHK has been unable to suppress the popular and heroic revolt by a third generation of Kashmiris. Unable to admit this, India seeks to deflect world attention from its brutal tactics by blaming Pakistan for the infrequent militant violence in IHK.<\/p>\n

In the aftermath of a major militant attack, Modi and his BJP cohorts may be tempted to actually undertake \u2018punitive\u2019 strikes across the Line of Control especially to burnish the BJP\u2019s waning popularity in the run-up to the 2019 Indian elections. Significantly, the BJP has ousted chief minister Mehbooba Mufti and now rules Kashmir directly from New Delhi.<\/p>\n

A perceptive article by Prem Shankar Jha on The Wire analyses \u2018The BJP\u2019s Dangerous End Game in Kashmir\u2019. Jha argues that the BJP\u2019s strategy for victory in 2019 is \u201cto push Hindu-Muslim polarisation\u201d. This strategy is \u201cnow yielding diminishing returns on the mainland. It is therefore, time to look outside the country for a source of this (Muslim) threat. The obvious candidate is Pakistan, and the obvious place to make this threat credible is Kashmir\u201d.<\/p>\n

Despite the shortcomings of the report, Pakistan should actively support the establishment of the proposed commission of inquiry by the Human Rights Council and offer to allow its visit to AJK. It should lobby for this decision with members of the OIC, Western countries which espouse human rights and the \u2018human rights community\u2019. It should be argued that an amelioration of India\u2019s human rights violations will serve to moderate militancy in IHK and thus also serve the cause of peace.<\/p>\n

If India rejects the establishment of the commission, Pakistan should utilise the UN report to seek support for other specific means of ending the human rights violations in IHK. These could include:<\/p>\n