Stockholm, Sweden. February 7, 2025, (TW) __ Kashmir Solidarity Day has been observed all over the six continents of the world. In Europe one such event took place in Stockholm, the Capital city of Sweden. The event was organized. by Kashmir Council Sweden, which is headed by a young, energetic human rights activist of Kashmiri heritage, Sardar Tamur Aziz.
Sardar Tamur Aziz thanked the participants for expressing their solidarity with the people of Indian occupied Kashmir. He said that the objective of the Kashmir Coutil Sweden is to advocate for a peaceful resolution to the Kashmir conflict, ensuring the rights and freedoms of the people of Kashmir and promoting their right to self-determination. Council emphasizes an end to human rights abuses in the region and aims to provide Kashmiri voices a platform in international forums.
One of the main highlights of the event was the speech of 10 years old Sweden born Kashmiri girl, Maryam Tamur who said since, August 5, 2019, the Indian government, in order to crush any resistance to their illegal occupation, has instituted new draconian measures. Peaceful protests were countered with brute force and several innocent Kashmiris were killed. There is no freedom of expression and press freedom has been totally muzzled. Maryam added that India’s claim that Kashmir is an integral part of India has no takers. Antonio Gutters has articulated the position of the United Nations when he said on August 8, 2019, that Kashmir issue has to be resolved in accordance with the UN. Charter and applicable UN Security Council resolutions.
“I want to tell my Kashmiri brothers, sisters and particularly youth that they are not alone, we are with them. We will become their eyes and ears here in Sweden,” Maryam said with her tender voice.
Ambassador Bilal Hayee, Pakistani Ambassador to Sweden & Finland expressed his gratitude to the Pakistani and Kashmiri community for their commitment to the cause of the oppressed people of Kashmir. He said that all draconian laws enacted in Indian occupied Kashmir, in particular the Domicile Law is designed to change the demography of Kashmir. But the people of Kashmir, young and old, men and women had not relented in their desire to realize the right of self-determination, promised by the United Nations.
Ambassador Hayee emphasized that although the unilateral action taken by India on August 5, 2019, violates not only international law but also UN Security Council resolutions. The world powers know that Kashmir has an international sanctity and it is their responsibility to come forward and initiate a peace process with which not only India and Pakistan are associated but the All parties Hurriyat Conference as well.
Since august 5, 2019 India is pursuing the policy to alter the demographics of the territory. Hundreds of thousand militant Hindus and army personnel have been provided domicile certificates and allotted land that has been grabbed from local Muslim population. Currently almost hundred percent of top-level bureaucracy and police official are Hindu outsiders who don’t demur to implement oppressive measures on the people of Kashmir. The final objective is to deprive people of their livelihood, convert Muslim majority to Hindu Majority and restrict the local population to ghettos.
Dr. Ghulam Nabi Fai, Chairman, World Forum for Peace & Justice said that the global Kashmiri diaspora’s explosive frustration is to the monumental revulsion against the ‘land-grab’ which is the grotesque violations of their basic human rights. More specifically, the people of Jammu & Kashmir believe that this recent ‘land grab’ clearly, is an attempt to change the demographics of Kashmir.
Dr. Fai warned that eviction and demolition would be war crimes according to the international law because it violates various internationally recognized human rights. The Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court reiterates several crimes under international law, including displacement of the civilian population, deportation or forcible transfer of population as a crime against humanity or war crime.
“An unresolved Kashmir dispute, the occupation of Kashmir in defiance of the people’s wishes has damaged India’s democratic credentials and hence her standing and aspiration for an enhanced status in the United Nations is a point of emphasis in the pleadings of a number of articles written by Indian intellectuals, academics and diplomats which appeared not only in the mainstream Indian press but in foreign newspapers as well. Only shallow thinking will regard this current of Indian position as inconsequential.
Video messages of Barrister Sultan Mahmood Chaudhry, President AJK and Ambassador Sardar Masood Khan, former President of AJK were played.
A moving documentary on the plight of Kashmiris was well received by the audience
Photo exhibition depicting the atrocities committed by Indian army was also displayed.
Others who spoke included: Choudhary Zafar Iqbal, Chairman Kashmir Council Sweden (KCS); Sheikh Saeed Ahmed, Bilal Mustafa, Ms. Syeeda Wardah and others.
Dr. Fai is also the Secretary General, World Kashmir Awareness Forum.
He can be reached at: WhatsApp: -1-202-607-6435. Or. gnfai2003@yahoo.com