Farkhund Yousafzai
Islamabad, 16 August 2024 (TDI): Pakistan on Friday strongly condemned the storming of Al-Aqsa Mosque by hundreds of extremist settlers, led by officials from the Israeli occupation authorities.
Foreign Office spokesperson Mumtaz Zahra Baloch said during the weekly briefing that the desecration of one of the holiest sites of Islam and the obstruction of worshippers’ rights have deeply hurt Muslims globally.
She described this act as a violation of the Geneva Convention and a blatant disregard for several UN Security Council resolutions concerning the historical city of Jerusalem.
The FO Spokesperson urged the global community, particularly the UN Security Council, to take immediate action to end the serious and repeated violations of the sanctity of holy sites in Jerusalem.
The call included protecting the Islamic character of Al-Aqsa and ensuring the freedom of worship for the Palestinian people.
“We share the concerns of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) about the peril posed by the Israeli occupation’s policies, aimed at altering the Islamic and Arab character of the occupied city of Jerusalem,” she said.
“Yesterday marked a tragic milestone in the current conflict affecting the people of Gaza,” she said, adding that Israeli occupation troops have killed 40,000 Palestinians, the majority of whom were women and children. The ongoing genocide in Gaza must end, and Israel should be held accountable for its war crimes and crimes against humanity.
She said that Islamabad would continue to extend political, diplomatic, and moral support to the Kashmiri people for a just and peaceful resolution of the Jammu and Kashmir dispute, in accordance with United Nations Security Council Resolutions.
Strongly condemning the killing of 4 Kashmiri youths by Indian forces in the Doda district of Indian Illegally Occupied Jammu and Kashmir (IIOJK), she said this brutal action by the Indian occupation officials served as yet another example of their illegal and oppressive measures against Kashmiri people.
“We urge the global community to take immediate and decisive action to hold New Delhi accountable for its egregious human rights violations in the occupied valley and to take steps to protect the rights and freedoms of the Kashmiri people”, Baloch said.
