[Reader-list] against continued repression of the people of Kashmir

[Subhash]

Please sign a petition against continued repression of the people of
Kashmir and killing of innocent civilians by Indian paramilitary
forces

http://www.petitiononline.com/ksn2un/petition.html

Please sign and forward to your networks

For more information on the situation in Kashmir,
http://kafila.org/2010/06/30/if-protest-could-kill-what-would-bullets-do/
http://kafila.org/2010/06/29/iptl-statement-on-military-governance-in-indian-administered-kashmir/

This summer Indian troops and police have systematically murdered
around 20 people in the streets and forests of Kashmir. In April,
three innocent youth were shot in cold blood in Machil forests of
north Kashmir, and then portrayed as terrorists, to earn rewards
instituted by the Indian government for troops who kill insurgents in
Kashmir. It was only after incessant protests by local people that the
bodies where exhumed and identified as local youth. Just before this
fake encounter, a 70-year old man was also killed in the same area,
and projected as a foreign terrorist. His son identified him after his
picture appeared in the newspaper. In a similar incident in April,
Indian soldiers shot dead a local villager carrying firewood from the
forests of Kellar in south Kashmir.

In protest against these killings people in Kashmir initially
attempted to stage peaceful demonstrations. They demanded that the
culprits be brought to book. The government, instead of assuring
people that impartial enquiries into the incidents would be conducted
and those responsible would be punished, launched a full-scale assault
on protest demonstrations and clamped down heavily against any
dissent.

Indian paramilitary forces (CRPF) have killed more than a dozen
teenage boys and a young woman while protesting against this recent
spate of fake encounters in Kashmir. One of those killed is 9-year old
Tauqeer Ahmed, who was not even part of the protests. In Anantnag,
where three boys were killed, eyewitnesses claimed the teenagers were
dragged out of their homes and shot in the courtyard of one of the
houses. A 24-year old woman was shot in her chest by CRPF in Srinagar
while looking at the street protests from a window of her house. The
authorities have also incarcerated dozens of teenagers, some as young
as 12 and 13.

For the last three weeks the government has imposed strict curfew on
people’s movement. There have been reports of mass beatings and
molestations in a number of localities. Many people, especially in
Srinagar and other towns, are facing extreme shortages of food and
medicine. The sick and injured have been barred from reaching
hospitals. Staff members of various hospitals have said they were
beaten up and their curfew passes torn.

Indian government has imposed a gag order on the media in Kashmir,
only letting a select few pro-establishment journalists to report.
Local journalists and cameramen in a joint statement said their passes
were snatched and their equipment broken. Government has refused to
issue new passes to them. As a result very little information is
flowing out of Kashmir. Some Kashmiri activists who uploaded videos of
street demonstrations have been sent to prison. Cell phone services
have been jammed at various places, while the government has banned
short messaging services as well (third time in the last three years).

Around 700,000 Indian soldiers patrol the streets and villages of
Kashmir. Together they occupy almost 100,000 acres of land. For a
population of 5 million Kashmiris the soldier to civilian ratio of
around 15 to 1 is extremely disturbing and fraught with heavy risk to
civilian life. The Indian government first deployed a significant
chunk of its military to battle militants fighting to liberate Kashmir
from Indian rule. The armed insurgency itself had resulted from a
violent quelling of popular pro-freedom protests of the early 1990’s.
For the last 7 years, however, the Indian government has repeatedly
said that not more than a few hundred ragtag militants remain in the
fight. Yet India maintains a massive military manpower and
infrastructure in Kashmir, which has created structural conditions of
oppression of Kashmiris.

Everyday life in Kashmir is highly militarized. People continuously
face risks to their lives and are subjected to threats and
humiliation. The Indian government, instead of taking action against
human rights violators, shields them from prosecution. Draconian laws
like the Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA) and the Disturbed
Areas Act have been put in place to give immunity to security agencies
against any civil prosecution. Over the last 20 years, tens of
thousands of Kashmiris have been killed or forcibly disappeared.
Thousands are languishing in jails for demanding a political solution
to the Kashmir issue. Under the Public Safety Act hundreds of
activists remain in jail without trial. For the last few days, law and
order in the Srinagar has been handed over to the army, raising fears
of increased civilian casualties.

The international community has largely remained silent on the plight
of Kashmiris. Apart from a few exceptions, the international news
media has failed to report on the systematic nature of oppression in
Kashmir. It is time the human rights and global justice activists
express their solidarity with the struggling people of Kashmir. It is
time that we collectively put pressure on the Indian government.

We call upon the UN, which has a long association with the Kashmir
issue, to press the Indian government to:

*End its militarized governance of Kashmir, and withdraw army from
populated areas,
*Revoke the draconian Armed Forces Special Power Act (AFSPA), which
gives Indian troops immunity from civil legal action and promotes HR
violations,
*End oppression of Kashmiri people, release political prisoners and
young boys from jails, and lift the overwhelming security apparatus
from Kashmir,
*Initiate meaningful plans to democratically resolve the issue, and
include Kashmiris as the primary party to such a process.

Sincerely,

Please sign the petition at

http://www.petitiononline.com/ksn2un/petition.html