Sorcha Dannsair posted this photo from a Scottish newspaper of a protest in Glasgow on April 6, 1962 demanding freedom for the Kashmiri people. The history of Kashmiri solidarity is likely an uneven one since most of us did not know about the freedom struggle until Kashmiri activists began using social media to educate & campaign. But due to the complete lockdown of Kashmir last year & the unspeakable use of pellet guns, the issue of Kashmiri freedom is now ‘internationalized’ & a central issue in world politics.

Kashmiri sarcasm

The UN Security Council is an entirely undemocratic institution with five permanent members (China, France, Russia, UK, US) & ten elected members with terms of two years. Why do five or even fifteen nations get to call the shots in world politics when there are 195 countries in the world? It is no exaggeration to call that structure a colonial arrangement coming out of World War II. It has no relevance to the world today except as a governing body for international militarism & finance. When it comes to Palestinians, Kashmiris, Rohingya, Uyghur, Congo, Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Yemen, Somalia, Libya, the UN has been accomplice to oppression offering only toothless lip service to those sustaining war, occupation, genocide.
Today, the UN General Assembly will elect five of the non-permanent members to replace five whose terms are up. Kenya & Djibouti are competing for the African seat; Canada, Ireland, & Norway are competing for the Western European & Others seat. Mexico is unopposed for the Latin American & Caribbean seat & India is running unopposed for the Asia-Pacific seat which assures that India will be on the UNSC. There’s a lot of drama around this election, like that for high school prom queen. But the consequences of legitimizing India as a leader in world politics are considerable when it comes to the Kashmiri struggle for self-determination.
What’s wrong with India playing a leading UN role? In a 43-page report issued in July 2019 before the August lockdown, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (again) accused India of human rights violations in Kashmir & called for a commission of inquiry. Just days after the lockdown on August 5th, the UN came out with wimpy protestations that the lockdown was ‘deeply concerning’ & could exacerbate the human rights situation in Kashmir. Condemnations don’t get tougher than that–at least coming from the UN. Accusations of human rights crimes & the lockdown didn’t stop the UN from allowing an extravaganza honoring Modi on their premises in September 2019. Just days ago, UN Secretary-General Guterres issued his annual report on Children & Armed Conflict where he called out India for a range of crimes against Kashmiri children including pellet guns, arrests during night raids, internment at army camps, torture in detention & detention without charge or due process. So will Guterres challenge India’s election? Or do the monstrous crimes committed against Kashmiri men, women, & children or the legalization of persecuting Indian Muslims not matter in the deliberations?
This is a photo of 26-year-old Amir Kabir Beigh from Baramulla, Kashmir. He is one of thousands of Kashmiris disfigured & disabled by pellet guns. The young man reports that he has gone through several surgeries but is still completely blind. When will his voice be heard by the UN? With India in the driver’s seat at the UNSC, we are assured his voice will never be heard at the UN.
(Photo by Camillo Pasquarelli)

Posted June 17, 2020

Omar Abdullah deactivated his Twitter account today after getting his ass kicked by Kashmiris for tweeting, “Those Kashmiris tempted to look towards China as some sort of saviour need only google the plight of Uighur Muslims.” Does he see legions of Kashmiris cheering on the Chinese army in the military confrontation with the Indian army in the Galwan Valley of Ladakh? Does he actually believe Kashmiris don’t understand militarism & colonial occupation after 73 years of colonialism & occupation? Or is he playing up to the Indian Army in hopes they will help him establish his old glory as a collaborator? Even after playing a Nelson Mandela impersonation as a political prisoner (detained in health spa accommodations), he has no more value as a collaborator since he is so discredited among the Kashmiris who he holds in such contempt. If he had only listened to the voices of Kashmiris rather than his Indian colonial masters, he might not have to hide in shame today.

“The world knows it by Kashmir, but it has many more names,
The land of martyers
The Paradise turned graveyard
The land of blood soil
Worlds most militarized zone
The land of pain
The land of injustice
Where we hear cries, we moan every morning when we wake and before every night we sleep.
#freeKashmir
#GoIndiaGoBack”
–Fatima Naqshbandi

There was an Indian military operation last night in the Zadibal & Zoonimar Pozwalpora areas of Srinagar. It was a joint operation of the J&K police with Rashtriya Rifles & CRPF special forces. Since the Modi regime can’t even tell the truth about its confrontation with Chinese troops in Ladakh, we can’t be sure what is true in its reports about military operations in Kashmir. Nationalist media has an ironclad formula to report these operations which obviates the need for any real journalism. The formula is: Indian Army set up a cordon around an area after getting tips that armed militants were hiding there; Army starts vandalizing & destroying family homes only after the militants begin shooting; ‘terrorists’ are killed.
Indian officials report that last night they brought in the parents of the young men they were hunting to persuade them to surrender but the young men still refused. That must be when they brought in the bazookas. If you can’t persuade them to come out in the open to be shot down in front of their parents then destroy the entire area. Nationalist media reports that three terrorists were killed & two guns recovered. Does that mean there were only two guns between three men? Did it take Carl Gustav bazookas in a densely populated urban area to hunt down three men with two guns? The Army alleged the young men were involved in the killing of BSF border patrol troops in the Pandach area of Srinagar last month. Is the Carl Gustav how the Indian Army administers due process in Kashmir? Does an allegation make the bazooka judge, jury, & executioner?
India has been using Carl Gustav bazookas since 1976 & makes the M2, M3, & M4 in its ordnance factories. It’s not certain if the one in this photo is the M3 or the newer generation M4. It’s a gun used by 40 countries including by US-NATO forces in Afghanistan. When the Swedish manufacturer Saab boasts of its versatility, we should keep in mind that the Carl Gustav of every generation is a primary weapon of terrorism, not an instrument of liberation. Out of its many versatile functions, the Indian Army in Kashmir uses it mainly to blow up family homes & lay waste to entire areas.
When Swedish moochocrats Carl Gustaf & his wife Silvia paid a state visit to India in December 2019 at the height of the lockdown, the old boy said Sweden has had observers in Kashmir ‘for many many years’. Well at least since India began using the Carl Gustav in Kashmir to make sure it’s operational & suited for destroying family homes, certainly not to monitor the human rights situation since he refused to comment on that. When asked if Sweden would make any offers to mediate on Kashmir the old boy boy cited a policy of not commenting on political issues. He lets the bazooka speak for Sweden. Carl & Silvia Gustav should have gone to Kashmir to see how their ‘observers’ are working out but as part of greenwashing the occupation, they went to the Versova seafront in India for a beach clean-up of plastic. Very much like Modi going to the UN last September & talking about getting rid of single-use plastic bags rather than the lockdown.
Kashmir is an unarmed civilian population. There is no place for bazookas or pellet guns. Stand with Kashmiris & demand the immediate, unconditional withdrawal of all Indian military forces from Kashmir.
(Photo of Zadibal & Zoonimar Pozwalpora by Basit Zargar)

Posted June 21, 2020

My land is left with:
A diary of Manan wani
Smile of Shoab Akhoon
Kunan-poshpura
Asiya and neelofar
Ailing Syed Ali Shah Geelani
27 years of qasim faktoo
Determination of Asiya andrabi
Crackdowns, CASO’s
Hollow graves of Maqbool Bhat,afzal guru
Broken promises, dreams
Last audio calls of mothers
Gaw Kadal,sopore and handwara massacre
Unknown graveyards
Rubble and debris
Blood stained teeths
Wailing mothers
Pellet victim hibba
Orphans all around
Shrieks and pain
Torture marks
Pale faces
Encounters
And what else you want?
-Irfan Rashid

‘While our rebels pose little threat to India in strategic terms (something that we need to deliberate over), it is their existence that constantly reminds the State of the fact that its military might shall not cow us into submission. The masses love these young boys because they embody selflessness and resistance. I have seen mothers adoring them more than their own children. The State may invest all its energy into dehumanizing them, but let it be known that these young boys are not strangers. They are from us and we are from them.’
–Ahmed Bin Qasim