Right of Reply by India under Oral Update of the High Commissioner under Agenda 2 at the 45th Session of the Human Rights Council
(14 September – 06 October 2020) delivered by Mr. Pawankumar Badhe,
First Secretary, Permanent Mission of India (Geneva, 15 September 2020)
Mr. Vice- President,
We exercise our right of reply to the statements made by Pakistan, Turkey and the OIC under the oral update of the High Commissioner.
Mr. Vice- President,
2. It has become a habit for Pakistan to malign my country with false and fabricated narratives for its self-serving malicious purposes. Neither India nor others deserve this unsolicited lecture on human rights from a country that has consistently persecuted its ethnic and religious minorities, is an epicenter of terrorism, has the distinction of providing pensions to individuals on UN Sanctions list and has a Prime Minister who proudly admits training tens of thousands of terrorists to fight in Jammu and Kashmir. Its not surprising that other relevant multilateral institutions have been raising serious concerns on its failure to stop terror financing and lack of effective actions against all terror entities in Pakistan.
Mr. Vice- President,
3. The nefarious designs of Pakistan continue in Pakistan Occupied parts of Indian Union Territories of Jammu and Kashmir and Laddakh. The mass influx of outsiders has whittled down the number of Kashmiris to an insignificant number in Pakistan occupied parts of Indian Union Territories of Jammu and Kashmir and Laddakh. In its zeal to reassert its theocratic ideology, it has ensured that ethnic and religious minorities have no future through systematic persecution, blasphemy laws, forced conversions, targeted killings, sectarian violence and faith-based discrimination. Thousands of Sikh, Hindus and Christian minority women and girls have been subjected to abductions, forced marriages and conversions in Pakistan.
4. The plight of people under its subjugation is well represented by the state of affairs in Baluchistan, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Sindh. Not a single day has gone by when a family in Baluchistan doesn’t find its members picked up or kidnapped by the security forces of Pakistan.
5. Pakistan does well when it comes to intimidation and attacks against journalists, human rights defenders and political dissidents in particular by its state machinery. It is not without a reason that Pakistan has been highlighted by international organizations as a country where journalists are slain and their killers go scot free.
Mr. Vice- President,
6. As esteemed members of HRC are aware, Pakistan has been abusing various HRC mechanisms and platforms for raising issues, which are extraneous to the mandate of the HRC and which relate to internal affairs of India, with a view to distract the attention of the international community from serious human rights violations committed by it against its own people, including in Indian territories occupied by it. We hope that Pakistan would desist from doing so.
7. We reject the reference made by the OIC to the Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir which is an integral part of India. The OIC has no locus standi to comment on internal affairs of India. The OIC has allowed itself to be misused by Pakistan to subverse its own Agenda. It’s for the members of the OIC to decide if it is in their interests to allow Pakistan to do so.
Mr. Vice- President,
8. I again advise Turkey to refrain from commenting on the internal affairs of India.
Thank you, Mr. Vice- President.
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