Mr President, confrontation should not be our destiny in South Asia. Pakistan wants peace with India. We have gone the extra mile to achieve this, repeatedly offering the dialogue on all outstanding issues. But India has posed unacceptable pre-conditions to engage in a dialogue. Let us be clear. Talks are no favour to Pakistan. Talks are in the interest of both countries. They are essential to resolve the differences between the both countries, especially the Jammu and Kashmir dispute and to thwart the danger of any escalation.

Mr President, peace and normalization between Pakistan and India cannot be achieved without the resolution of the Kashmir dispute. This is an objective evaluation, not a partisan position. Our predictions have now been confirmed by events. A new generation of Kashmiris have risen spontaneously against India’s illegal occupation. Demanding freedom from occupation. Burhan Wani, the young leader murdered by Indian forces, has emerged as the symbol of the latest Kashmiri Intefada of popular and peaceful freedom movement, led by Kashmiris, young and old, men and women, armed only within undying faith in the legitimacy of their cause, and a hunger for freedom in their hearts.

Mr President, this indigenous uprising of the Kshmiris have been met as usual with brutal repression by India’s occupation with over half a million soldiers. Over hundred Kashmiris have been killed, hundreds including children and infants blinded by shotgun pellets, and over 6000 unarmed civilians injured over the past two months.

These Indian brutalities are well documented. I would like to inform the General Assembly that Pakistan will share with the Secretary General with a dossier containing detailed information and evidence of the gross and systematic violation of human rights committed by Indian forces in occupied Jammu and Kashmir. These brutalities will not suppress the spirit of the Kashmiris. It will only intensify their anger and fortify their determination to see India end their occupation of Kashmir. From Srinagar to Sopore, the men, women and children come out each day, defying curfew to demand freedom.

Mr President, Pakistan fully supports the demand of the Kashmiri people, for self-determination as promised to them by several Security Council resolutions. Their struggle is a legitimate one for liberation from alien occupation. International law and declarations of the United Nations on self-determination five the Kashmiri people the right to struggle for their freedom. Every year, the General Assembly unanimously adopts the resolution which reaffirms the right of all peoples to self-determination, and calls all the States concerned to immediately end their occupation and all acts of repression.

Mr President, on behalf of the Kashmiri people, on behalf of the mothers, wives, sisters and fathers of the innocent Kashmiri children, women and men who have been killed, blinded and injured, on behalf of the Pakistan nation, I demand an independent inquiry into the extra-judicial killings and a UN fact-finding mission to investigate brutalities, perpetrated by Indian occupying forces so that those guilty of these atrocities are punished. We demand the immediate release of all Kashmiri struggle prisoners and end to the curfew, freedom for the Kashmiris to demonstrate peacefully, urgent medical help for the injured and the abrogation of India’s draconian laws.

Mr President, the Security Council has called for the exercise of the right to self-determination by the people of Jammu and Kashmir through a free and fair plebiscite held under United Nation’s auspices. The people of Kashmir have waited 70 years for implementation of this promise. The Security Council must hounour its commitments by implementing its own decisions. This General Assembly must demand that India deliver on the commitments its leaders solemnly made on many occasions. To this end, steps should be taken by the United Nations to demilitarize Jammu and Kashmir and undertake consultation with India, Pakistan as a true representative of Kashmiri people to implement the resolution of the Security Council. In this context, we welcome the offer of the good offices by Secretary General Van-ki-Moon. We are also open consultations to members of Security Council explore the modalities of implementation of the Security Council resolutions on Kashmir.

Mr President, the international community ignores the danger of the rising tensions in South Asia at its own peril. For its part, Pakistan is committed to the of strategic stability in the region. It neither wants nor is it engaged in an arms race with India. But we cannot ignore our neighbour’s unprecedented armed build-up. And, we will take whatever measures are necessary to maintain credible deterrence.

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