ISLAMABAD: Pakistan on Sunday condemned killing of Burhan Wani, a Kashmiri freedom fighter, by the government forces in India-held Kashmir as the death toll from clashes between Indian troops and Kashmiri people in the region rose to 15.
“The extra-judicial killing of Burhan Wani and scores of other innocent Kashmiris is deplorable and condemnable,” Foreign Office spokesman Nafees Zakaria said. He said that such acts were a violation of the fundamental human rights of Kashmiris and they could not deter the people of Jammu Kashmir from their demand for their right to self-determination.
The spokesman also expressed Pakistan’s concerns over the detention of the Kashmiri leadership in the state and called upon the Indian government to fulfill its human rights obligations as well as its commitments under the UN Security Council resolutions. He reiterated Pakistan’s stance that the resolution of the Kashmir issue was only possible through the realisation of the right to self-determination of the Kashmiri people as per UN resolutions through a fair and impartial plebiscite.
Wani was the son of a school headmaster and had become a freedom fighter over the last five years. He regularly posted video messages online and invited young men to join the national independence movement. Indian authorities imposed an indefinite curfew in most parts of the disputed state after Wani was killed but massive protests continued despite the attempts to suppress struggle.
In Islamabad, Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf Chairman Imran Khan also strongly condemned the brutal killing of the innocent Kashmiris in the disputed state. in a press statement, he said that the extrajudicial killing of Wani and scores of other innocent people was condemnable.
In Srinagar, Jammu Kashmir Liberation Front Chairman Muhammad Yasin Mallick also condemned the reign of terror that has been unleashed against the Kashmiri people throughout the disputed state during which more than two dozen innocents have fallen victims to the bullets of Indian soldiers and police.
Yasin, who is in police custody, said that after the killing of Burhaan Muzaffar Wani, the way in which whole Kashmir is being terrorised by the police, forces and army is glaring example of the oppressive behaviour and the dictatorial mindset of Indian rulers and their Kashmiri stooges.
He said that India and its forces have started a war against Kashmiris to keep its illegal occupation on Kashmir in-tact and within some hours more than two dozen innocents have lost their lives as a result. He said that today the police and the forces were not even sparing those who were injured or their families and even the hospital wards had been turned into torture centers for them.
