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Human Rights Are Universal and No Longer Accepted as Domestic Jurisdiction: Dr. Fai
Washington, D.C. July 8, 2012. “No human rights are self-executing. Thus, everyone who participates in raising the issues of civil and political rights does yeoman’s service on behalf of the oppressed. What is even more impressive is the willingness to invite risks to life, liberty, and property by those who would speak in the name of civil and political rights against autocratic or cruel regimes. How many unknown champions lie unremembered and unheralded in graves?” said Dr. Ghulam Nabi Fai on the eve of the 105th session of the United Nations, Human Rights Committee which will be meeting in Geneva between July 9 – 27, 2012. The Human Rights Committee is the body of internationally known 18 independent experts who are elected for a term of four years. Currently, Dr. Zonke Zanele Majodina of South Africa is the Chairman of the Committee. The Committee monitors implementation of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights all over the world.
Why President Obama Ignores Human Rights in Kashmir
Since the current uprising in Kashmir began with the killing of Burhan Wani on July 8, the unjustifiable and violent attack with bullets, birdshot from pump-action shotguns and extreme cane beatings by Indian military forces upon many of some 200,000 mourners who attended his funeral, who were in technical violation of a rigid curfew that was established by the police and armed forces, has provoked numerous demonstrations and violent clashes between residents. Demonstrations have occurred across the globe by non-resident Kashmiris and other human rights activists. The curfews and clashes have now been sustained for over five weeks, with limited or no access to the basic necessities of life, including food, power and fuel, and the protests have continued almost unabated, with injuries reaching close to 10,000, deaths over 85, and some 570 at last count left blinded, and many more maimed from what have been euphemistically called “pellet” wounds. While Kashmir has been under siege for many decades by the largest military occupation in the world, the recent uptick in what is nothing less than an effort to terrorize the population into submission and silence has been particularly brutal.
Bad for Business: India’s White Elephant Kashmir – Part 1
It is nothing less than astounding that intelligent men who are charged with the responsibility of leading a country cannot comprehend that spending billions of dollars to maintain possession of a very small disputed territory to its north with millions of troops at the expense of their own national quality of life makes any sense at all. While millions of Indians don’t even have a toilet (As Prime Minister Modi said, “My real thought is to first have toilets and then temples”)and live in squalor in cardboard shelters, the government feeds off their meager incomes in order to possess and control a nation that itself is kept in a dire state economically and cannot possibly pay any return on such an investment.Preventive Diplomacy: Successes & Failures
“It is also true that there is no peace and sustainable development without respect for human rights.” Antonio Guterres, Secretary General- elect of the United Nations
“Mankind must put an end to war or war will put an end to mankind.” President John F. Kennedy
It has always been a challenge to exchange views on conflict prevention and the summoning into being a peaceful and prosperous world. The intellectual debate is great, but the stakes are even greater. Men and women have yearned for peace and prosperity for ages. President Abraham Lincoln in his second inaugural address declared, “Fondly do we hope, fervently do we pray, that this mighty scourge of war may speedily pass away.” Winston Churchill brilliantly recognized that it is invariably better to jaw-jaw than to war-war.
Kashmir is an international issue and not internal matter of India
Dr. Ghulam Nabi Fai, Secretary General, World Kashmir Awareness said that Ms. Sushma Suraj’s assertion at the United Nations that Kashmir was an integral part of India was factually and legally wrong statement. Because under all international agreements, accepted by both India & Pakistan, negotiated by the United Nations and endorsed by the Security Council, Kashmir does not belong to any member state of the United Nations. If Kashmir does not belong to any member state of the United Nations, then the claim of Ms. Sushma Suraj that Kashmir was an integral part of India does not stand. Again, if Kashmir was not the integral part of India, then Kashmiris cannot be and should not be called secessionist or separatist, because Kashmiris cannot secede from a country – like India to which they have never acceded to in the first place.
Be Back Soon
Be Back Soon
Dr. Ghulam Nabi Fai
Washington, D.C.
Tuesday, July 10, 2012Saying goodbye is sometimes easy but sometimes a very difficult thing to do, particularly when I am saying goodbye, though temporarily, to freedom and to a mission that I have given my life to. But the real goodbye is not the words that I have formed in my head because there are none that express how I really feel. The goodbye is in a slowly swelling sense of absence of all the people and places and efforts I have put my heart into that has become like a flower near a pond that may dry up for lack of rain. Its sustenance is going away. The absence is the letting go of all the things that I embrace. How does one let go of love? How does one let go of one’s heart, one’s very life? A life is not merely held within one’s blood circulating in the body or in the breath that one takes. It is so much more in all the people that I have lived for and my beloved country of origin, Kashmir – the paradise on earth.
