LAHORE:President SAARC Chamber of Commerce and Industry Iftikhar Ali Malik on Wednesday condemning the Indian government’s illegal step of August 5, 2019 of revoking the special status of Indian Illegally Occupied Jammu and Kashmir (IIOJK), said that international community should play its role for security, peace and freedom of the Kashmiri people.
Talking to reporter, he said that Pakistan would mark August 5 as ‘Kashmir Exploitation Day’ to raise voice against illegal revocation of special status of Indian Illegally Occupied Jammu and Kashmir on this day in 2019, adding that world should take notice of state-sponsored terrorism in Indian held Jammu and Kashmir.
The SAARC president said that this Indian step would be remembered as the darkest day in the history, adding that Pakistanis were standing with their Kashmiri brethren in this need of the hour.
The peaceful struggle of the Kashmiri people was aimed at achieving the goal of self-determination, he said and added that durable peace and stability could not be achieved in the region without solving the core issue of Kashmir.
Iftikhar Ali Malik said that Kashmiris had faced extra-judicial killings, custodial tortures and deaths, arbitrary detentions, burning and looting of houses and other worst forms of human rights abuses, adding that Kashmir was an internationally recognized disputed territory and scrapping its special status was not only a violation of the United Nations resolutions on Kashmir but also a blatant violation of international law.
He said that India should withdraw all illegal and unilateral actions of August 5, 2019 and stop its illegal actions to change the demographic structure of the occupied territory.