J&K: UN Security Council asked India, Pakistan to solve Kashmir dispute bilaterally, says envoy
Pakistan Foreign Minister Mehmood Qureshi said the meeting served as a ‘stark repudiation of the Indian claim that Jammu and Kashmir is an internal matter’.
Indian diplomat TS Tirumurti on Wednesday said Pakistan’s attempt to internationalise the Kashmir dispute through the United Nations had once again “come to naught”, after a meeting at its Security Council ended without any definite outcome, PTI reported. This was the third time in a year the United Nations Security Council discussed Kashmir.
Wednesday’s meeting was convened by China and came on the first anniversary of the abrogation of special status of Jammu and Kashmir under Article 370 of the Indian Constitution. China had called for the discussion in the Security Council under “Any Other Business”.
“In today’s meeting of UN Security Council which was closed, informal, not recorded and without any outcome, almost all countries underlined that Jammu and Kashmir was bilateral issue and did not deserve time and attention of Council,” Tirumurti, who is India’s permanent representative to the United Nations, tweeted. “Another attempt by Pakistan fails.”
Earlier in the day, Beijing claimed that New Delhi’s unilateral changes to the status of Jammu and Kashmir were “illegal and invalid” and that the dispute must be resolved peacefully through dialogue. India in return, has asked Beijing to keep out of its internal affairs.
Meanwhile, Pakistan Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi said the Security Council meeting was a “mark of solidarity of the international community and Council members with the people of “Indian illegally occupied Jammu and Kashmir subjected to a savage military siege”.
“Pakistan is thankful to all members of the UN Security Council, especially China, for the support in organizing today’s meeting on IIOJK [Indian illegally occupied Jammu and Kashmir],” he said in a series of tweets.
He said the meeting served as a “stark repudiation of the Indian claim that Jammu and Kashmir is an internal matter”. It further reaffirmed the validity of the UN resolutions on the Kashmiris’ right to self determination through an impartial plebiscite, Qureshi added.
“India’s illegal, and unilateral actions sought to change globally recognised disputed status and alter the demography of the disputed valley,” he said. “Despite Indian lobbying attempts, today’s deliberations reflect international community’s grave concern for peace, security and human rights in IIOJK. India’s gross human rights violations and crimes against humanity in IIOJK remain a grave concern for the international community.”
A security lockdown was imposed in Jammu and Kashmir on August 5 after Parliament revoked its special constitutional status, detained several political leaders, and severed communication links. Eleven days later, the Security Council conducted the first closed-door meeting even as India reiterated that Kashmir was an internal matter. It was the first time in over 50 years that the UN Security Council held a meeting exclusively to discuss Kashmir. The second meeting was held in January.
On Wednesday, India had ridiculed a new “political map” of Pakistan, that includes Jammu and Kashmir, and Junagadh in Gujarat, in Pakistani territory. The Indian government called the move an “exercise in absurdity”.
On Tuesday, Indian diplomat TS Tirumurti said Pakistan’s attempts to involve the United Nations to resist the changes brought about in Jammu and Kashmir subsequent to August 5 have “fallen flat”. He said no formal meeting of the Security Council on the India-Pakistan issue has taken place since November 1965 and the recent meetings were “closed-door” and “completely informal”.