The Joint Resistance Leadership (JRL) of Syed Ali Geelani, Mirwaiz Umar Farooq and Mohammad Yaseen Malik Wednesday asked people to stage peaceful protests against suspension of death sentence to army men involved in Machil fake encounter and persecution and arrest of separatist leaders.
In a joint statement, the separatist leaders said BJP-led government in New Delhi was working on pushing from all ends to crush the people’s movement in Kashmir.
“Crackdown has been launched against separatist leadership. Besides, there was a propaganda blitzkrieg to target the leadership and their activists to malign them and link them to subversive activities in order to implicate them in fabricated cases and label people’s movement as sponsored Islamic terrorism abetted by Pakistan. This major ploy aimed at strengthening and institutionalizing New Delhi’s hold on Jammu and Kashmir is being quietly aided and facilitated by Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti, who was once a great votary of facilitating dialogue with Government of India (GoI) for resolution of Kashmir dispute,” they said.
Condemning the arrest of senior separatist leader Shabir Ahmed Shah by the Enforcement Directorate and subsequently taking him to Delhi for questioning and arrest of other Hurriyat leaders by NIA, they said lodging them in Delhi tantamount to kidnapping of these leaders.
On suspension of life imprisonment awarded to army men involved in Machil fake encounter, the leaders said, “It was the murder of justice. Despite thousands of incidents of grave human rights violations committed by the forces, not a single army man has been punished. Suspending the punishment to army men involved in the Machil fake encounter shows how a system is working hard to ensure clean chit and high morale to those involved in killing of Kashmiri people and encouraging them to do so with impunity.”
“70 years of peoples’ movement to self determination has been nourished by blood and supreme sacrifices of life and honour of lakhs of people of Jammu and Kashmir and now our younger generation is also struggling to seek this fundamental right. And like every political movement of this nature, it is vibrant and dynamic constantly adapting to changing times with the values of justice and right to sovereignty at its core. And as long as these values are dear to us, we can never be defeated,” they said.
The leaders urged people to peacefully protest “murder of justice” by suspension of death sentence to the army men involved in Machil fake encounter after Friday prayers (July 28). “People must also protest the persecution and arrest of separatist leaders by GoI through its agencies”.
Joint Resistance Leadership calls Friday protests against military court’s ruling, arrest of separatists
