The ministers of caretaker government led a rally of students, civil society, media and people from other walks of life to mark the Kashmir Solidarity Day in the Federal Capital on Monday.
The Foreign Office was starting point of the rally that culminated at D-Chowk near Parliament with massive participation of government officials, students and civil society that observed a one-minute silence to express solidarity with the Kashmiri brothers.
Foreign Secretary, Muhammad Syrus Sajjad Qazi, staff and officials of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MoFA), Minister for Religious Affairs Aneeq Ahmed, Minister for Information and Broadcasting, Murtaza Solangi and Minister for Privitization, Fawad Hassan Fawad, students of Pakistan Sweet Homes and large number of members of the civil society participated the rally.
The participants of the rally held placards and banners with slogans reading Freedom for Kashmir, Kashmir is Pakistan, Kashmir–the Largest Jail on Earth, Indian Apartheid of Kashmiris Unacceptable, whereas the students of Pakistan Sweet Homes hoisted flags of Pakistan and Kashmir to express solidarity with the Kashmiri people.
Addressing the rally, Convener, All Parties Hurriyet Conference (APHC) Mahmood Ahmad Sagar thanked the government and entire Pakistani nation, its all political parties, non-governmental organizations and children of Pakistan Sweet Home for supporting Kashmiris on February 5.
According to the state news agency, Sagar said the IIOJK was facing 76-year long oppression that resulted in the martyrdom of 3.5 lac valiant Kashmiris struggling for freedom, whereas 2.5 lac people were massacred in 1947 in Jammu, and in the last 30 years over one lac deaths were caused in violence by Indian Occupant forces that left millions orphaned and widowed alongwith massive infrastructure and property losses.
The occupied valley for years have been facing internet disruption which was the biggest tool of the current era, he said, adding, “The Pakistani nation is supporting Kashmiris and all the diaspora world over for Kashmir cause.”
Meanwhile, Special Assistant to Prime Minister on Human Rights and Women Empowerment Mushaal Hussein Mullick in her video message on the occasion, thanked the entire Pakistani nation, people of Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK) and people all over the world for expressing solidarity with the oppressed people of IIOJK who were running their legitimate, political and peaceful indigenous and just struggle for right to self determination and liberation as per the UN resolution for the past many decades. “Today people are talking about apartheid in Gaza because their footage is going viral but it should be remembered that there has been a more serious escalation in human rights abuses in IIOJK against innocent Kashmiris.
Hundreds of thousands of people have rendered their lives for the cause of freedom,” she added. Mullick said the Indian occupant forces were using pellet guns, white phosphorous, rape as war weapon against women, TARA, POTA, UPA, Armed Forces Special Act type laws were imposed in IIOJK that gave immunity to the Indian RSS forces. She urged the world that they were running out of time as India had scaled up its settling of non-Kashmiri residents in the occupied valley to the demography of the Kashmir and had issued five million domiciles to non-state residents so far. “India has planned to achieve this Muslim Kashmiri majority transformation into a minority within a year. India is doing the genocide of Kashmiris to make them extinct in the valley. I request all who are joining the protests to highlight all the Indian atrocities across the globe,” she said.
Caretaker Federal Minister for Information, Broadcasting and Parliamentary Affairs Murtaza Solangi said that every generation of Kashmir had created a new story of courage, bravery and steadfastness by resisting illegal Indian occupation of their homeland.
Paying tributes to the sacrifices of the Kashmiri people, he said their fourth generation was waging struggle against Indian oppression and the time was not far when they will get rid of illegal Indian occupation. He said that at the time of partition of the subcontinent, India illegally annexed the state of Jammu and Kashmir.
