Daily Times

Pakistan has accelerated its efforts to highlight violations of human rights in India-held Kashmir (IHK) at the international level and these efforts have started bearing fruit. Indian Prime Minister Nirandara Modi is off to France to attend the G-7 summit. In Paris, he was greeted by slogans and protests in favour of Kashmiris’ right to self-determination and against Indian aggression. Host French President Emmanuel Macron urged Modi to find a solution to Kashmir dispute through dialogue with Pakistan. It is a big change in French-Indian relations which traditionally have hinged on arms deals. Macron also told him that India and Pakistan should stop things from further escalation, which is good, given the fact that Pakistan has not started this confrontation.

Prime Minister Imran Khan has gone very proactive, calling German Chancellor Angela Markel who expressed concerns on escalation of hostilities in the region due to the IHK dispute. Germany is also a member of G-7 and Chancellor Markel said that they have kept the Kashmir situation under observation. Similarly, the United States has long been pushing for a solution to the Kashmir dispute and President Donald Trump has offered to mediate between India and Pakistan more than once. Pakistan has also been expressing its commitment to resolution of this dispute as per UN resolutions, agreed upon by all the great nations of the world.

PM Imran Khan told President Trump in Washington that Pakistan accepted his mediation on the Kashmir dispute. He has been raising awareness in a big way on social media about the Hindu extremist government hell bent on ethnic cleansing of Muslims in Kashmir. His activism has flouted all the attempts by the Modi government to divert attention of the world from Kashmir.

At the same time, Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi has written yet another letter to the UN High Commissioner on Human Rights, bringing attention towards the indefinite curfew and gags that have been placed on the Kashmiris by the Modi government. All these developments have taken place on the global stage within a couple of days, indicating that Modi is going to face tough questions in the G-7 moot.

If Pakistan continues tracking the issue like this, it will put immense pressure on Modi to start respecting international laws and treaties and stop ethnic cleansing of Kashmiris. The Pakistani government’s efforts to highlight Modi’s crimes against humanity will put him in a state where he will feel that he cannot do it anymore because the world is watching. *