United Nations (TDI): Pakistan strongly criticized India at the United Nations for disregarding its obligations under Security Council resolutions that guarantee the people of Jammu and Kashmir their right to self-determination.
Speaking at the General Assembly’s Special Political and Decolonization Committee, Pakistan’s delegate Asif Khan said India’s ongoing “settler-colonial project” in the disputed territory was a blatant violation of international law.
“Jammu and Kashmir is not, and has never been, an integral part of India,” Khan asserted, while exercising his right of reply to N.K. Premachandran, an Indian parliamentarian who claimed that the region “will always remain” part of India. Premachandran had also accused Pakistan of promoting terrorism and commented on its internal matters.
Rejecting those allegations, Khan described India as “the world’s largest producer of disinformation,” emphasizing that Kashmir’s status remains internationally recognized as disputed and must be resolved through a free and impartial plebiscite under UN supervision.
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Citing the 1960 UN Declaration on the Granting of Independence to Colonial Countries and Peoples, he said, “All peoples under foreign domination have the right to self-determination,” a principle also enshrined in the UN Charter.
Khan added that India has long attempted to distort the reality in Kashmir by portraying the region’s indigenous struggle for freedom as terrorism. He said India is denying fundamental rights to Kashmiris through extrajudicial killings, enforced disappearances, mass detentions, sexual violence, and demographic manipulation.
While India portrays itself as a victim, Khan argued, “the truth is that it is the principal sponsor of state terrorism in the region,” accusing New Delhi of financing militant groups such as TTP, BLA, and the Majeed Brigade, responsible for attacks that killed thousands of civilians in Pakistan.
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The Pakistani envoy dismissed India’s claim of being the “world’s largest democracy” as hollow, saying that the ruling RSS-BJP ideology has institutionalized Islamophobia and turned the persecution of minorities into state policy. He noted that these violations have been widely documented by international human rights organizations.
Recalling recent border tensions, Khan said India’s unprovoked aggression in May, which targeted civilians, including women and children, was met with a measured and proportionate response from Pakistan, focused solely on military targets. “India suffered significant losses, including multiple aircraft downed,” he added, crediting Pakistan’s restraint and international mediation for preventing a wider conflict.
Concluding his remarks, Khan reaffirmed that Pakistan would continue to expose India’s “hypocrisy and state-sponsored terrorism” while standing firmly with the Kashmiri people in their struggle for justice, dignity, and freedom.
