UNITED NATIONS – Pakistan on Thursday brought into sharp focus of the worldcommunity the atrocities being committed by Indian occupation forces inJammu and Kashmir, and urged the UN Security Council to resolvelong-standing conflicts on its agenda.
“Inaction by the Security Council in cases of foreign aggression andoccupation comes at a high human cost,”Ambassador Maleeha Lodhi said in anopen Council debate on ‘Protection of Civilians in Armed Conflict’,referring to the continuing violations of International Humanitarian Law bywarring parties with impunity.
“In Indian occupied Jammu and Kashmir,” the Pakistani envoy said, “theoccupying forces continue to show utter disregard for human life bysystematically violating the fundamental norms of internationalhumanitarian law and by using civilians as human shields.
“Worse, perpetrators who commit such crimes are not only protected underblack laws, but are honoured by the military command.”
The rules of conduct in armed conflict are clearly codified in the 1949Geneva Conventions and additional protocols and constitute the bedrock ofinternational humanitarian law, she said. Yet this law continues to beflouted whenever and wherever hostilities break, with women bearing thebrunt of the atrocities.
“Whether it is plausible deniability or abuse, the grim reality is, whenthe beast of conflict roars, legal regimes fall silent,” Ambassador Lodhitold the Security Council.
Today, she said, targeted attacks, sexual violence, forced conscription,torture, indiscriminate killings and gross human rights violations wereused cynically as tools of war in conflicts.
In this context, the Pakistani envoy pointed out that reports of the use oftorture as an instrument of repression in Indian occupied Jammu and Kashmirhave been verified by the Special Rapporteur on Extrajudicial Executionsand Torture, and by prominent rights groups in India. A recentevidence-based report, she said, draws attention, once again, to theculture of impunity and lists multiple cases involving chilling methodsused to torture civilians.
“The Security Council, as the primary body tasked with maintaininginternational peace and security, should focus on the root causes ofemerging and longstanding conflicts, including Palestine and Jammu andKashmir, and find inclusive political solutions,” Ambassador Lodhi said.But unfortunately, legal and moral values were sacrificed at the altar ofpolitical expediency.
As a result, she said, civilians, who should be the primary subject ofprotection, have become the principal objects of attack.
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For UN peacekeeping operations, protection of civilians should be apriority, Ambassador Lodhi said. “As one of the world’s leading troopcontributors to UN Peacekeeping, Pakistan’s well-trained and professionalpeacekeepers have protected civilians, provided them much-needed medicalcare, and rebuilt communities.”
In conclusion, Ambassador Lodhi underscored the need to upholdinternational conventions as their spirit was to protect human dignity evenin the midst of war.
“The goal of protection of civilians can best be achieved by preventing theoutbreak of armed conflict in the first place. Anything short of that wouldbe treating only the symptoms and not the disease,” she added.
Opening the debate, Secretary-General Antonio Guterres told the SecurityCouncil that while safeguards built into the conventions were stronger,“compliance has deteriorated”.
“We are rightly critical when assessing the state of the protection ofcivilians, for there is great cause of concern”, he said.
At the same time, the UN chief walked members through 20 years of progress,saying that a “culture of protection” had indeed “taken root” thatencompasses a comprehensive framework based on international law, andbecoming one of the peace and security body’s “core issues”.
Despite this, grave human suffering is still being caused by armedconflicts and lack of compliance with international humanitarian law and“civilians continue to make up the vast majority of casualties”, Guterressaid.
