NEW YORK: Pakistan has slammed India for abstaining from a United Nations General Assembly‘s- (UNGA) landmark resolution against Israel’s illegal occupation of Palestinian territories, saying that New Delhi’s move reflects its intentions of converting Indian Illegally Occupied Jammu and Kashmir’s (IIOJK) Muslim majority into a minority, by implementing the Israeli model of demographic engineering in the disputed territory.
The 193-member assembly on Friday voted 87 against 26 – with 53 abstentions – in favour of a resolution calling on the UN’s decolonisation committee to request an advisory opinion from the International Court of Justice (ICJ) on Israel’s prolonged occupation of Palestinian territory.
The resolution, which was co-sponsored by Pakistan, saw Western nations divided, but garnered unanimous support of the Islamic world and major powers like Russia and China who voted in favour of the resolution.
Israel and 25 other members, including the United States, the United Kingdom and Germany, voted against the resolution, while 53 nations including India and France abstained from it.
“India’s abstention on the UN resolution derives from its own agenda of occupation in Jammu and Kashmir, usurpation of Kashmiri lands, demographic change, and denying right to self-determination – the precise issues of Israeli occupation on which UNGA has sought an advisory opinion from the ICJ.” Pakistan’s envoy to the UN, Munir Akram said while talking to APP.
He added, “Israeli culpability in Palestine will also confirm India’s culpability in IIOJK.”
The landmark resolution against Israel’s illegal occupation
The resolution titled ‘Israeli practices affecting the human rights of the Palestinian people in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem’ urges the ICJ to determine the “legal consequences of Israel’s prevalent “violation of the Palestinians’ right to self-determination” and its attempts to alter “the demographic composition, character and status” of the holy city of Jerusalem.”
The resolution also calls on the UN Secretary-General to present a report on its implementation in the upcoming UNGA session in September 2023.
Palestine’s permanent observer to the UN, Ambassador Riyad Mansour hailed the nations that voted in favour of the resolution and remained “undeterred by threats and pressure.”
Indian agenda of demographic engineering in IIOJK
By repealing Article 35 A of its Constitution in August 2019, India unilaterally facilitated Israeli-style settlements in Jammu and Kashmir in what was an attempt to carry out the ethnic cleansing of indigenous Muslim residents of the region. With the illegal move, the Hindutva Modi regime stripped Kashmiris of the semi-autonomy they had for seven decades through a rushed presidential order.
Meanwhile, with the revocation of Article 370 of the Indian constitution, people from the rest of the country were permitted to acquire property in IIOJK and settle there permanently. Kashmiris as well as critics of the Modi regime considered the move an attempt to dilute the demographics of Muslim-majority Kashmir with Hindu settlers. – APP
