Petition asks UN body not to drop Kashmir report

LONDON: A leading Kashmiri rights campaigner and lawyer has launched an online petition to stop the United Nations Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) from dropping the “UN Report on Kashmir” which was published in June 2018 recognising gross human rights atrocities in Indian occupied Kashmir.

Barrister Majid Tramboo has launched the petition urging the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) to hold a panel discussion on the report.

The UN Report on Kashmir is prepared by OHCHR through remote monitoring. The focus of the Report is on the situation of human rights in the Indian Occupied Jammu and Kashmir from July 2016 to April 2018 over which period there were widespread and serious human rights violations including extra judicial killings, torture, rape and gang rapes, excessive use of force, illegal draconian laws, enforced disappearances, use of pellet- firing shot guns, arbitrary arrests and detention including minors.

Barrister Tramboo said that OHCHR is likely not to take any further action on the UN Kashmir Report because of non-cooperation from the stakeholders. He said that India has refused permission to the officials of OHCHR to grant access to the occupied territory time and again because the government of India attempts to hide its crime against the people of Kashmir. He said that Pakistan has always offered its assistance to the international community but that is conditional to Indian acceptance. He said that the issue of genocide and utter gross human rights abuses exists in Indian occupied Kashmir, not in Azad (free) Kashmir.

Barrister Tramboo said: “It is a conflict that has robbed millions of their basic human rights including their inalienable right to self determination and continues to this day inflicting untold enormous human tragedy on Kashmiris which is against the very basic norms of humanity.”

Barrister Tramboo was born in Srinagar but was forced to leave the valley with his family living in exile in the United Kingdom. He is well known for running campaigns to raise awareness about the issue of Kashmir in Europe for more than three decades. He practises as a lawyer in English courts. Barrister Tramboo appealed all the humanity to sign the petition as civil society has huge influence on inter-governmental organisations like OHCHR