*AhlulBayt News Agency (ABNA):* A former chief justice of Gambia suggestedPakistan approach the International Court of Justice (ICJ) regarding thecontinuing rights violations in Indian-administered Jammu and Kashmir.
Retired Justice Ali Nawaz Chowhan, according to a statement issued by theSrinagar-based Legal Forum for Oppressed Voices of Kashmir (FLOVK) onSaturday, said Pakistan being an important party to the long-standingdispute should approach the UN court.
Chowhan made the remarks during a three-day moot competition, The CasePertaining to Kashmir Dispute in Islamabad.
FLOVK, which organized the event, is an international legal organizationwhich defends “the political, social and human rights of Kashmiris.”
“If Gambia can approach the ICJ under the section of violation of humanrights, why not Pakistan,” he was quoted as saying, Anadolu Agency reported.
Pakistani authorities must explain the reason for the delay, he added.
Chowhan, a Pakistani national, was a judge in The Hague from 2006 to 2009.He later served as chief justice of Gambia between 2014 and 2015.
The former judge urged for efforts to get Kashmiris recognized before theUN the way Palestinian bodies are represented at the international forum.
“There are UN resolutions on Kashmir, they nurture the struggle of Kashmirbut when we wish to address the legal aspect of the dispute, one fails tounderstand why Pakistan as a state and an important party to this disputefails to approach the ICJ,” he said.
At the inaugural session of the moot court, Khalid Rahman, head of theIslamabad-based Institute of Policy Studies (IPS), highlighted Pakistan’sKashmir policy after India stripped the disputed region of its specialautonomous status last year.
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Pakistan, he said, needed to improve its policies “because the paradigmshift has changed the dimension of Kashmir dispute”.
He urged the Pakistani government to never step back on the issue.
Indian-administered Kashmir has been under a near-complete lockdown sinceAug. 5 when New Delhi ended the previously codified constitutionalregulations for the Muslim-majority region.
Several rights groups, including the Human Rights Watch and AmnestyInternational, have repeatedly called on India to lift the restrictionssuch as internet ban, and release political detainees.
Kashmir is held by India and Pakistan in parts and claimed by both in full.A small sliver of the state is also held 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 the disputed state have been fighting againstIndian rule for independence, or for unification with neighboring Pakistan.
According to several rights organizations, thousands of people have beenkilled and tortured in the conflict since 1989.
