41st Session UNHRC: Intervention by Ms. Veronica Ekelund - Research Analyst EFSAS
03-07-2019, Geneva
Text and video of Ms. Veronica Ekelund's Intervention on General Debate Item 4 (Human rights situations that require the Council's attention) during the 41st Session of the UN Human Rights Council.
Video of Ms. Veronica Ekelund's Intervention on General Debate Item 4 during the 41st Session of the UNHRC
"Mr. Vice President,
Respect for human rights is universal and paramount and applies to all countries including India and Pakistan.
And Terrorism, is the most deplorable violation of human rights.
Yet, remarkably, an office as exalted as that of the High Commissioner for Human Rights did neither deem Terrorism, nor its consequences, important or relevant enough to include in its first ever Report on Jammu & Kashmir.
The fact that all terrorist organizations operating in Jammu & Kashmir are headquartered in Pakistan, and continue to receive patronage from Pakistan’s Army in order to wage its proxy war in Jammu & Kashmir, has also been completely disregarded in this Report. This unabated export of terrorism has caused the killings of over 14,000 civilians and more than 5,000 security personnel since the 1990s.
Mr. President,
In the absence of terrorism and religious radicalization exported to Jammu & Kashmir by the Military Establishment of Pakistan, the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights would, in all likelihood, not have grounds to even refer to Jammu & Kashmir, let alone prepare an inaccurate report on it, which instead of taking the violent invasion of the State in 1947 as a starting point, attempts to vitiate history by narrowing the conflict down to a two- year period, beginning with the death of a terrorist in 2016.
As such, a rectification of a Report on an issue as weighty as the one in question so as to firmly address the menace of Terrorism and its consequences is both warranted and justified.
Thank you".
