The Black Day marked in Oslo, Norway
I am in deep shock to watch the videos and news coming from the Indian Occupied Kashmir. The current uprising begins when Indian forces killed a young Kashmiri leader Burhan Muzaffar Wani on July 8. Over 90 unarmed protesters have been killed and 16000 wounded, including 400 young people blinded by pellet guns used to put down demonstrations in recent months but people of Kashmir have shown unmatchable determination to obtain freedom, no matter how much suppression India inflicts on them”.
The Kashmiri people, like people everywhere, deserve their fundamental human rights. They should be allowed to speak, communicate and assemble freely. They should live free of fear and repression. The inhuman treatment to the people of Kashmir must be halted. Kashmir, which was known as the paradise on earth, has become the most beautiful prison in the world. The presence of more than 700,000 Indian military and paramilitary forces have made Kashmir the largest army concentration anywhere in the world. President Bill Clinton has called Kashmir the most dangerous place on earth. Today, ladies and gentlemen, the people of Kashmir are living under the barbaric rule of India. Today is the 110th day of the continuous curfew that has been imposed by the Indian army on the civilian population of Kashmir. You may not know what does curfew means because you are living in the most civilized nation of the world – Norway.
Today we want to shake the conscience of the people of Norway and Western countries to wake up and raise their voice for the human right and human dignity. Ladies and gentlemen, the demand of the people of Kashmir is nothing more than what Norwegian Ambassador to the United Nations, Ambassador Arne Toraff Sunde stood up for when he voted for the resolution # 80 which was adopted on March 14, 1950. That resolution called “ for the demilitarisation of the State of Jammu and Kashmir and for the determination of its final disposition in accordance with the will of the people through the democratic method of a free and impartial plebiscite.
Ali S. Khan ended his speech with this quote of Martin Luther King: “In the end, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends.”
Other speakers urged that world need to acknowledge the seriousness of the situation in occupied Kashmir in which over 90 innocent precious lives had been lost, more than 15 000 people had been wounded and hundreds have lost their eyesight due to the firing of Indian forces on peaceful protesters. They appealed to the international community to break its silence over the brutalities of Indian police and troops in the occupied territory.
Speakers also referred to the United Nations resolutions, which called for demilitarization of the state and to settle the status of the state in accordance to the wishes of the people of the Jammu and Kashmir.