Muzaffarabad (POJK), July 5: Pakistan-occupied Jammu and Kashmir (POJK) was on full boil today, as Pakistani forces carried out brutalities in a failed attempt to crush the mass uprising by Kashmiris, killing one of them.
The Pakistani forces resorted to unprovoked firing at a number of places in POJK in an attempt to dissuade Kashmiris from participating in an agitation against oppression by Pakistan and for their basic rights.
The mass agitation, virtually an uprising, has been going on for the last one month and its organizer J&K Joint Awami Action Committee (JAAC), a conglomerate of several non-political organisations, had given a call for total shutdown and protests across POJK today.
In response to the call, lakhs of people staged protests, demonstrations and rallies all over POJK, highlighting how the illegal occupier Pakistan has been carrying out oppression against Kashmiris over the last 78 years.
Speakers at the protest meetings and demonstrations pointed out how Pakistan has been denying even basic rights to the people of POJK, which includes food grains.
In an attempt to scuttle the protests, the Pakistani military carried out a brutal crackdown.
It resorted to direct firing at peaceful protesters and in one such incident, a young man was killed in Dadyal in Mirpur district. Several others were injured in firing by the Pakistani military elsewhere.
The killing enraged Kashmiris further and they vowed to avenge it.
The Pakistani forces also arrested thousands of people.
The JAAC said Pakistani forces opened fire and used shelling to disperse demonstrators, leaving several critically injured.
“Police and Rangers’ shelling and firing on peaceful protesters at Dadyal Amb’s location. One person martyred and multiple individuals injured due to Rangers’ firing,” said Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaaf (PTI) party in a social media post.
According to JAAC, thousands of people, including women, children and elderly residents, gathered at Sardar Ghulam Hussain Khan Sports Stadium in Abbaspor before joining the wider protest movement.
JAAC also said large protest convoys continued reaching the Rawalakot sit-in site while parallel demonstrations were held in several towns across POK.
PTI’s POJK unit said demonstrations were held across several parts of the region in solidarity with an ongoing sit-in at Rawalakot and to press for what it described as basic constitutional and economic rights.
According to it, hundreds of people, including women, participated in demonstrations in Charhoi while protest caravans continued moving towards Rawalakot.
Amidst the brutal crackdown and food blockade imposed by Pakistan, JAAC leader Sardar Aman Khan appealed to people in Srinagar, Ladakh, Poonch, Rajouri and Jammu to stand with residents of POjK.
In a video message, Khan said Pakistani authorities have intensified their crackdown on protesters and even disrupted food supplies.
“We have faced atrocities. Our food has been stopped,” he said while urging people across Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh to express solidarity with the movement.
Speaking at a large gathering in Rawalakot earlier, Khan also accused Pakistan of hypocrisy over its treatment of Kashmiris, evoking slogans like “yeh jo dehshatgardi hai, iske peeche vardi hai (those in uniform are behind this terrorism).”
“They say they were terrorists. Actually, it was Pakistan Army that put guns into the hands of Kashmiris. Kashmiris had guns because the Pakistan Army gave them those guns. The entire Pakistan Army did it. And today, they have the audacity to call us terrorists,” he said.
Earilier, addressing thousands of cheering supporters, Khan said, “Kashmir is not a part of Pakistan… We do not need Pakistan; rather, it is Pakistan that desperately needs Kashmiris.”
The unrest has also drawn criticism from international rights groups.
Amnesty International recently condemned Pakistan’s decision to designate the Jammu Kashmir Joint Awami Action Committee as a “proscribed organisation,” calling the move a disproportionate restriction on freedom of association and peaceful political activity.
The organisation also criticized heavy-handed measures against protesters ahead of the upcoming regional elections.
The protests are being led by JAAC for a 38-point Charter of Demands, which includes economic reforms, an end to the unequal distribution of local resources, the withdrawal of excessive paramilitary deployment and greater political autonomy. (NVI)
