Raids on human rights defenders in Indian-administered Kashmir showcontinued restrictions on civil society, which impair the public’s rightsto impart and receive information and debate the government policiesaffecting them, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bacheletsaid in a statement on Friday.
Bachelet said restrictions on communications and the clampdown on civilsociety activists in Kashmir “remain of concern.”
“Despite the recent restoration of 4G access to mobile phones, thecommunications blockade has seriously hampered civic participation, as wellas business, livelihoods, education, and access to health-care and medicalinformation,” the statement said.
High-speed internet was restored on Feb. 6 after a shutdown since Aug. 4,2019, when India imposed a military and communications clampdown, besidesarresting thousands of pro-freedom activists.
Last October, India’s National Investigation Agency (NIA) raided theoffices of the Jammu and Kashmir Coalition of Civil Society and the home ofKhurram Parvez, its coordinator.
The NIA also raided the office of the Association of the Parents ofDisappeared Persons, which seeks the whereabouts of thousands of Kashmirisallegedly subjected to forced custodial disappearance by Indian forces.
Global human rights groups have expressed concern over these raids. In astatement last October, Amnesty International said these raids were “analarming reminder that India’s government is determined to suppress alldissenting voices in Jammu and Kashmir.”
Last Thursday, seven UN rapporteurs said in a statement that India’sdecision to strip Kashmir’s autonomous status in 2019 and the introductionof new residency laws “could curtail the previous level of politicalparticipation of Muslims and other minorities.”
On Friday, Shehryar Khan Afridi, the head of the Pakistani Parliament’sCommittee on Kashmir, asked the UN secretary-general to act on a report ofUN rapporteurs and “impose sanctions on India for its demographicterrorism” in Jammu and Kashmir.
Speaking at a seminar at Nishtar Medical University in Multan, Pakistan,Afridi said top rights groups have also asked India to “immediately haltits suppression of Kashmiri voices.”
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*Disputed region*
Kashmir, a Muslim-majority Himalayan region, is held by India and Pakistanin parts and claimed by both in full. A small sliver of Kashmir is alsoheld by China.
Since they were partitioned in 1947, the two countries have fought threewars – in 1948, 1965, and 1971 – two of them over Kashmir.
Some Kashmiri groups in Jammu and Kashmir have been fighting against Indianrule for independence or unification with neighboring Pakistan.
According to several human rights groups, thousands of people have beenkilled in the conflict since 1989.
On Aug. 5, 2019, the Indian government revoked Article 370 and otherrelated provisions from its Constitution, scrapping the country’s onlyMuslim-majority state with its autonomy. Jammu and Kashmir was also splitinto two federally administered territories.
Simultaneously, it locked the region down, detaining thousands of people,imposing movement restrictions, and enforcing a communications blackout.