India and Pakistan Trade Accusations at UN Over Kashmir and Terrorism
At a session of the United Nations Human Rights Council, India and Pakistan exchanged sharp comments over the issue of Jammu and Kashmir. During an interactive dialogue on the annual report of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, India’s First Secretary at the Permanent Mission, Anupama Singh, exercised the right of reply after Pakistan’s representative raised the Kashmir issue.
Singh stated that Jammu and Kashmir "was, is, and will always remain an integral and inalienable part of India." She added that the only unresolved issue is Pakistan's "illegal occupation of Indian territories" and their return. She also criticised Pakistan's policies in the region it controls, referring to recent violence in Rawalakot, where clashes between protesters and security forces reportedly killed 11 people and injured over 100.
"The ongoing tragedy in Rawalakot, the killing of hundreds of civilians, and the brutal crackdown across Pakistan-occupied Jammu and Kashmir are the predictable outcome of a system built on forcible occupation and sustained through repression," Singh said. She accused Pakistan of military land grabs, demographic engineering, and denial of basic freedoms, stating that "demands for bread, electricity, rights, and dignity are met with bullets and brutality."
On the subject of terrorism, Singh asserted that Pakistan's defence minister "boasts of hosting, training and deploying terrorists as state policy." She called Pakistan a "living example of a Frankenstein state which is shocked when its own monster bites back," a remark that drew contrast to Pakistan's self-described victimhood of terrorism.
Singh also addressed the Indus Water Treaty, signed between India and Pakistan in 1960 and brokered by the World Bank. She noted that India suspended the treaty after a terrorist attack in Pahalgam in April 2023, which killed 26 civilians. "Our position on the Indus Water Treaty is well known. It defies logic that a state which exports terror as an instrument of policy continues to demand the privileges of cooperation predicated on goodwill and friendship," she said. She argued that the treaty is outdated given the changes over the past six decades.
The exchange underscores the longstanding tensions between the two nuclear-armed neighbours over the Kashmir region, which both claim in full but administer in part. India accuses Pakistan of supporting insurgent groups operating in Indian-administered Kashmir, while Pakistan denies the charge and raises human rights concerns in the Indian-administered area.
