Daily Times

A United Nations spokesman has said that the world body’s position on Jammu and Kashmir remains “unchanged”, saying that the final settlement of the dispute concerning Jammu and Kashmir is to be reached by peaceful means in accordance with the Charter of the United Nations and full respect for human rights.

“Our position on Kashmir remains unchanged,” Farhan Aziz Haq, the UN’s deputy spokesperson, said in response to a question about the deteriorating human rights situation in Kashmir and the continued suffering of the people there following India’s annexation of occupied Kashmir on August 5, 2019.

“The position of the United Nations on this region is governed by the Charter of the United Nations and applicable Security Council resolutions,” he told reporters Wednesday at the regular noon briefing.

“The Secretary-General,” Farhan Haq added, “also recalls the 1972 agreement on bilateral relations between India and Pakistan, also known as the Simla Agreement.”

Pakistan marked the fifth anniversary of the day when the Hindu nationalist government of Prime minister Narendra Modi stripped Indian-occupied Kashmir of its special status, which allowed it a separate constitution and inherited protections on land and jobs under Articles 370 and 35A of the Indian Constitution. Article 370 also forbids Indians from outside Jammu and Kashmir from permanently settling, buying land, holding local government jobs, and securing education scholarships. India’s move was accompanied by a telecoms blackout in Muslim-majority Jammu and Kashmir state, restrictions on public movement, and the deployment of thousands of troops. Apart from stepping up its repression, India has granted domicile certificates to thousands of Indians to settle in occupied Kashmir in a bid to change the State’s demographic character. The certificate, a sort of citizenship right, entitles a person to residency and government jobs in the region, which till last year was reserved only for the Kashmiris.