India Rebukes Pakistan at UN: Calls for J&K Territory to Be Vacated

India has strongly condemned Pakistan at the United Nations, accusing it of maintaining an illegal occupation of Jammu and Kashmir and calling for its immediate withdrawal.

India Permanent Representative to the UN, Parvathaneni Harish addresses an event organized at UN HQ on sidelines of the 69th session of Commission on the Status of Women (CSW). (PTI FILE)

India's Permanent Representative to the UN, Ambassador Parvathaneni Harish, expressed these views on Monday during the UN Security Council's Open Debate on Advancing Adaptability in UN Peace Operations.

“Jammu and Kashmir was, is, and will always be an integral part of India. Pakistan continues to illegally occupy the territory of Jammu and Kashmir, which it must vacate,” Harish said.

Harish's firm response came after Pakistan sought to bring up the issue of Jammu and Kashmir during the UNSC open debate. He stated that India felt it necessary to respond to the "unjustified remarks" made by the Pakistani delegate about the Indian union territory of Jammu and Kashmir.

“Such repeated references neither validate their illegal claims nor justify their state-sponsored cross-border terrorism,” Harish added that “we would advise Pakistan not to try to divert the attention of this forum to drive their parochial and divisive agenda.”

He further stated that India would abstain from providing a more detailed Right of Reply.

The ties between India and Pakistan deteriorated sharply after India revoked Article 370 of the Constitution on August 5, 2019, stripping Jammu and Kashmir of its special status and reorganizing it into two Union Territories.

India has consistently expressed its willingness to maintain normal and friendly relations with Pakistan, contingent upon the creation of an environment free from terrorism, hostility, and violence.

In February, India strongly criticized Pakistan’s comments on Kashmir at the UN Human Rights Council, dismissing them as “baseless and malicious.”

Responding before the Council, Indian diplomat Kshitij Tyagi accused Pakistan of propagating false narratives driven by its military-terrorist nexus and of compromising the credibility of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) by using it as a platform for such propaganda.

“It is regrettable to see Pakistan’s so-called leaders and delegates continuing to dutifully spread falsehoods handed down by its military-terrorist complex. Pakistan is making a mockery of the OIC by abusing it as its mouthpiece… The union territories of Jammu and Kashmir (J&K) and Ladakh will always remain an integral and inalienable part of India,” Tyagi highlighted the region's economic progress since the revocation of Article 370 in 2019.

(This Article was originally published by Hindustan Times)