Islamabad: A government official says voting has begun in Pakistan-controlled Kashmir to elect members of the local legislative assembly amid tight security.
Mian Naeem Ullah, secretary at the Election Commission, said elections were taking place yesterday for 41 seats of the assembly in a free, fair and transparent manner.
The vote is taking place a day after thousands of people in Indian-controlled Kashmir observed a “black day” to protest the killing of dozens of civilians in recent days. The largest street protests in years erupted after Indian troops on July 8 killed Burhan Wani, the popular 22-year-old leader of Kashmir’s largest rebel group.
Prime minister’s adviser Sartaj Aziz yesterday accused India of “state terrorism.”
He added that Pakistan has decided to approach the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) to investigate human rights violations in India-held Kashmir (IHK).
“We have requested UNHRC to send a fact-finding mission to India-occupied Kashmir and probe recent killings of innocent Kashmiris,” Aziz said.
He urged the international community to take notice of the situation in Kashmir and extend its support to the Kashmiri people.
Aziz rejected an Indian claim that the violence in Kashmir is India’s internal matter.
“It is not their internal matter because Kashmir issue is recognised under the United Nations,” Aziz said.
Aziz accused India of using state-sponsored terrorism to justify illegal occupation over Kashmir but stressed that India will not be able to legitimise its occupation.
When asked why Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif is not using his personal ties with Indian PM Narendra Modi to try and diffuse the situation in Kashmir, the adviser said PM Nawaz’s personal ties with Modi are not state ties.
When asked why the government has been unable to convene an all parties conference (APC) on Kashmir violence, Aziz said political consensus already existed among all political parties on Kashmir, hence there was no need to convene the meeting.
New Delhi’s response
India yesterday slammed Pakistan for its observance of ‘Kashmir’s Accession to Pakistan Day’, saying it exposes Pakistan’s “longing for the territory of Jammu and Kashmir” and demanded that Pakistan must vacate its “illegal occupation of POK (Pakistan-Occupied Kashmir)”.
In a strong statement, the Ministry of External Affairs spokesperson Vikas Swarup also demanded that Pakistan must “stop misleading the international community and Kashmiris through meaningless exercises such as the ‘so-called elections’”.