VIENNA – Austrian Senate Chairman Reignher Trodt has said that his countrywill play its due role in the resolution of Kashmir issue.

He was speaking as chief guest at a seminar hosted by Kashmir Institute ofInternational Relations (KIIR), a non-governmental organisation, at ViennaPress Club on Friday in collaboration with Social Democratic Party ofAustria, according to a message received here Saturday.

The objective of seminar was to apprise the external world of the increasedhuman rights abuses unleashed by the Indian forces in disputed Kashmirstate, KIIR Executive Director Sardar Amjad Yousaf later told APP overtelephone from Vienna Saturday.

Addressing the seminar, Reignher Trodt termed Kashmir a humanitarian issuecalling upon both India and Pakistan to resolve this issue according to theaspirations and wishes of the people of Jammu & Kashmir, principal party tothe much delayed issue between two nuclear armed arch rivals in South EastAsia.

Trodt said that 71-year old issue had consumed a lot of human lives andAustria would play its due part in resolution.

*The AJK legislative assembly speaker urged the world*community to end itssilence over the plight of the people of Indian held Kashmir, which hadbeen turned into hell by the Indian occupying forces in continued abortiveattempt to suppress Kashmiris’ just and principled struggle for freedom.

He also called upon India to end its intransigence on the issue.

The KIIR executive director said India, on one hand was committing massivehuman rights violations in the occupied Kashmir and on the other it wasinvolved in frequently violating the ceasefire on daily basis throughunprovoked firing on the civilians at the Line of Control.

“Thus India was involved in war crimes blatantly in the region,” heunderlined.

KIIR director programmes Altaf Hussain Wani gave a detailed account ofhuman rights violations in Indian held Kashmir.

*“There is very little choice between life and death. New Delhi* is usingall its military might to crush popular and civilian uprising against itsoccupation,” Wani said, adding that the right to life, the right to freedomof expression and opinion and all civilian spaces in the bleeding vale ofKashmir had been choked by the suppressive Indian forces.

Besides the Austrian Senate chairman, Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK)Legislative Assembly Speaker Shah Ghulam Qadir, KIIR Executive DirectorSardar Amjad Yousaf and Director Programmes Altaf Hussain Wani, localcommunity leader Dr Humira and office-bearers of Social Democratic Partyand others also addressed the seminar.