|

Kashmiri Americans Observed July 13th As the Martyrs Day: Dr. Fai

Articles, Uncategorised

Washington, D.C. July 13, 2014. The Kashmiri Americans join the worldwide Kashmiri community to observe “Martyr’s Day”, in memory of 22 Kashmiris killed by Dogra troops on this day in 1931. The ‘Martyrs Day’ memorializes all those innocent victims, nearly 100,000, “who have been forcibly silenced by the occupation forces that erupted two and half decades ago,” said Dr. Ghulam Nabi Fai, Secretary General of the World Kashmir Awareness.

Fai expressed concern over the on going tragic situation in Kashmir because all available evidence testifies that human rights violations are systematic, deliberate, and officially sanctioned. India has given its forces powers to shoot to kill and the license to abuse the people in whatever ways they like in order to suppress the popular movement for basic human rights and self-determination.

He emphasized, ‘India trembles at any attempt to resolve the Kashmir crisis because she is frightened by its outcome.’ When a former Defense Minister, Krishna Menon, was questioned as to why India would never hold a free self-determination election in Kashmir, he confessed that all of India’s political leaders knew it would lose. And would 700,000 soldiers be needed in Kashmir if the main opponents to India’s occupation were but a handful of outside “extremists”? The question answers itself.

Fai questioned the statement of India’s foreign ministry spokesman who said that Kashmir was an integral part of India. Kashmir is not an integral part of India, nor are Kashmiris separatists, he underlined. Because under all international agreements between India and Pakistan, negotiated by the United Nations and endorsed by the Security Council, Kashmir does not belong to any member country of the United Nations. So, the claim that Kashmir is an integral part of India does not stand. The people of Kashmir are not and cannot be called separatists because they cannot secede from a country to which they have never acceded to in the first place.

Even one of India’s well-known author, Ms. Arundhati Roy confirmed it by saying ‘It’s (Kashmir) not ever been really a part of India, which is why it’s ridiculous for the Indian government to keep saying it’s an integral part of India.’

Fai discounted the United States hopes that the Kashmir dispute could be settled through bilateral peaceful talks between India and Pakistan. He recounted the litany of failed bilateral efforts and said that the people of Kashmir have steadfastly maintained that tripartite talks are the only way to resolve the Kashmir issue.

We hope that the United States and the international community will realize that what is at stake in the dispute is not only the survival of the people of Kashmir but also the peace and stability in the region of South Asia, Fai stressed.

Similar Posts

  • |

    Kashmir’s Jalil Andrabi and China’s Chen Guangcheng: A Similar Path, but a Fork in the Road

    One of the darkest chapters of Indian judicial partiality was left hanging half closed and banging in the wind when Major Avtar Singh, the killer of internationally known human rights activist and Chairman of Kashmir Commission of Jurists, Advocate Jalil Andrabi, was found dead after he killed his wife and two children, and finally himself this past Saturday morning, June 9, 2012, in Selma, California. Avtar Singh, a fugitive from justice, who lived in the hot dry central California community, a suburb of Fresno, was clearly haunted by his past, a past that had seen the blood spilled of more than one man by his own hands. He had killed four others to hide the murder of Andrabi, and now he had killed his own family.  

    In killing Jalil Andrabi, Avtar Singh certainly did not act on his own volition. He was only a major.   His act was no doubt a response to orders from above and occurred in a longstanding climate of impunity that the Indian army enjoys in Kashmir.   The Armed Forces Special Powers Act, which gives any Indian soldier the right in Kashmir to take a Kashmiri’s life under any circumstance, has enabled such a climate for decades.  And Jalil Andrabi had become a hated, despised man by the Army, a man dangerous to the status quo of continued murder and torture that had been taking place in Kashmir’s jails, interrogation centers and detention facilities for many years.  

  • |

    Kashmir Awareness Campaign

    The purpose of this paper is to provide you with a plan to mount an educational and  awareness campaign in support of self-determination in Jammu & Kashmir and to enlist the support of foreign embassies in your country, NGO’s (both international and national) and media (both international and national)  to persuade India and Pakistan to include Kashmiri leadership in any future dialogue that will lead to the settlement of the Kashmir dispute.

  • |

    Dr. Fai to continue work for the cause of Kashmir during incarceration

    SAN FRANCISCO, CA. June 25, 2012 – Dr Ghulam Nabi Fai, the leader of Kashmiri freedom struggle, says during his incarceration at the minimal security Federal Correctional Institution (FCI) in Cumberland, Maryland, he will continue his work for the cause of Kashmir.

     

    Addressing a gathering of American Muslim leadership and well-wishers in Fremont, CA, Dr Fai said there is no restriction on him to continue his work for the cause of Kashmir. He pointed out that the prosecution had withdrawn charges initially leveled against him to be the agent of a foreign government.

     

    Dr. Fai begins a two-year imprisonment term on July 10, 2012 for violating certain tax laws related to non-profit organizations. On March 30th he was sentenced to two-year imprisonment for conspiracy and violations of certain tax laws. Although initially charged under the FARA [Foreign Agents Registration Act] as an unregistered agent of Pakistan, Dr. Fai was never convicted on this allegation, which seemed clearly intended to support negotiations the U.S. and Hillary Clinton were engaged in with India at the time, according to Paul Barrow, Director of United Progressives and the Director of American Affairs for the International Council for Human Rights and Justice.

  • |

    Kashmir Dispute: A Way Forward

    The dispute over the status of Kashmir can be settled only in accordance with the will of the people which can be ascertained through the democratic method of a free and impartial plebiscite, internationally supervised. This was the common ground taken by all the three parties to the dispute – viz.: the people of Kashmir, India and Pakistan. It was supported without any dissent by the United Nations Security Council – and prominently championed by the United States, Britain and France.

  • |

    Dr. Fai Welcomed Talks Between India and Pakistan

    Washington, D.C. July 6, 2012. Dr. Ghulam Nabi Fai has welcomed the foreign secretaries’ talks between New Delhi & Islamabad on July 4 – 5, 2012 where they exchanged views on the issue of Jammu & Kashmir and agreed ‘to continue discussions in a purposeful and forward looking manner with the view to finding a peaceful solution by narrowing divergences and building convergences.’ “These talks offer hope for peace in South Asia if the course of justice is followed and both parties undertake to abide by their commitments. The continuance of talks can only be useful if they reflect a sense of urgency and prepare the ground for an earnest effort at the highest level to frame a step-by-step plan of settlement of the Kashmir dispute. Mere persistence of talks at a level lower than political leadership of the two countries – and that too at a leisurely pace – will in no way defuse the situation. Unintentionally though, it will mock the agony of the people of Kashmir rather than assuage it,” Fai added.