DOCUMENT No. 12

Statement by Ambassador Munir Akram, Premanent Representative of Pakistan to the United Nations in Response to Indian Prime Minister’s Statement September 13, 2002

Mr. President, Pakistan has asked for the floor to respond to the rhetoric against my country by the distinguished Prime Minister of India. We had hoped for a response from him to the call for de-escalation and dialogue, which was offered by the President of Pakistan in his address yesterday.

Instead, we heard usual diatribe against my country. The Prime Minister spoke about nuclear blackmail. Let me remind him that it is India which has moved its troops to the frontiers of Pakistan. It was, Mr. Vajpayee himself, who threatened in May a ‘decisive battle’ against Pakistan. It was India, which had introduced nuclear weapons in South Asia. It was India, which initiated nuclear explosions in 1998. It was India, which declared itself a nuclear weapons state after those explosions. It was India, which announced a nuclear doctrine, which involves the deployment of triad of nuclear weapons in land, sea and air. It was Indian Army Chief who on the 11 January said that Pakistan could be threatened with a strike, which could make its continuation in any form doubtful. This is nuclear blackmail.

Pakistan has proposed a nuclear weapons free zone in the region for 20 years. We proposed nuclear restraint after the explosions. President Musharraf said that the use of nuclear weapons should be unthinkable that our conventional defence is sufficient to deter India. We have even proposed the de-nuclearization of South Asia.  Let India respond positively to our proposals.

If India sincerely wants to avoid the war, all Prime Minister Vajpayee has to do is to accept our President’s offer to withdraw the troops to peacetime locations, to accept reintroduction of the ceasefire on the LoC (Line of Control) which we had observed in the year 2000 and to resume the dialogue which was started and almost formalized in the declaration at Agra, which was agreed between our President and Prime Minister Vajpayee but was scuttled by certain hardliners in the Indian Government.

Mr. President, a dialogue is necessary when the two countries have differences. That dialogue must address the underlying causes of their differences and that is what the Secretary General and so many other people of goodwill have called for. But Indian Prime Minister even admonished them for suggesting that we should address the underlying causes of our differences.

In a rare admission, however, the Indian Prime Minister admitted that there was a call for plebiscite in Kashmir to decide its future. That plebiscite was called for by the UN Security Council. Yes fifty years ago. But it was repeated several times. A Security Council resolution does not become time barred. After all resolution 242 also is 35 years old. It is not time barred certainly.

No Security Council resolution is time barred until it is implemented. And India is the biggest violator for the longest time of the most number of the Security Council resolutions adopted by this distinguished organization.

Self-determination is an inherent right given by the Charter. It cannot be extinguished until it is exercised. The people of Jammu & Kashmir have that right to self-determination. That right to self-determination will not be extinguished until India accepts its exercise by the people of Jammu & Kashmir through what the Security Council has called “a UN supervised plebiscite.” India remains in violation of the Security Council resolutions until it accepts that. And we have all heard yesterday that Security Council resolutions must be implemented. We endorse that statement.

Mr. President, the distinguished Prime Minister of India spoke about elections in Kashmir. The Security Council had declared that such elections in Kashmir cannot be a substitute for plebiscite. But no elections can be fair and free when it is held under the jackboot of 700,000 troops, which India has deployed in Kashmir. No elections can be fair when India refuses the suggestion made, among others, by the Secretary of State of the United States to accept international monitors to see that these elections are fair. No elections can be fair when 25 of 40 leaders of the Kashmiri APHC, the conglomerate of 35 political parties of which 25 of the 40 leaders remain in Indian jails. Nobody has to interfere with these elections--so called elections. Mr. President, they have been rejected by APHC. They have been refused by the Kashmiri people. In fact these so-called elections were dead on arrival.

The Indian Prime Minister spoke about the large number of Muslims in India. He said they were 150 millions. We think he exaggerates. But certainly the number will not go up if the Hindu majority which Mr. Vajpayee leads in the BJP, if they continue the practice of massacring Muslims every few weeks. Since 1947, there have been 150000 communal riots in India; 3000 such riots every year. In February this year 2000 Muslims were killed mercilessly by mobs organized with the complicity of the state Chief Minister and his government. Over 2000 innocent men, women and children were killed. Women raped. Pregnant women killed in cold blood. There has been no accountability for this act of genocide against the Muslims of Gujarat. There has been a cover-up by the Government in New Delhi and there has been silence in this world and this hall.

Mr. Vajpayee spoke about communal harmony being the signature tune of the Indian civilization. Well Mr. President this signature tune is designed to lull the world while they continue the carnage of innocent Muslims.

Mr. President, India poses as the largest democracy in the world. We all know this corrupt democracy. It is, in our view, the largest hypocrisy of this world. In its short history, India has emerged as a state with a clear proclivity to resort to force or the threat to use of force. It has undertaken the largest number of conflicts with its neighbours. It has a conflict or dispute with everyone of its neighbours. It has 16 internal conflicts which are taking place. It is a country and a society driven by divisions and multiple apartheid of the caste system. This is a country which comes here to preach and lecture on democracy and terrorism. We do not accept the credentials of this hypocrisy. We ask this Assembly to call on India to stop the massacre of Muslims to stop the massacre of Kashmiris and implement the Security Council resolutions.

http://www.un.int/pakistan/00home02913.htm