Video | At UN, India rips apart Pak's ‘Delusional Tirade’ on Kashmiri women, cites ‘Operation Searchlight’ atrocities
In a powerful address at the UN, India’s envoy condemned Pakistan's claims regarding Kashmiri women, highlighting Pakistan's own history of human rights violations during Operation Searchlight, which saw mass atrocities against women.
India has once again ripped apart Pakistan's hollow claims at the United Nations, during a debate on women, peace and security.
Speaking at the UNSC debate, Permanent Representative of India to the UN, Parvathaneni Harish, called out Pakistan for its ‘delusional tirade’ against India, especially Jammu and Kashmir.
Ambassador Harish highlighted how Pakistan conducted ‘Operation Searchlight’ in 1971, where a ‘genocidal mass rape of 4,00,000 women’ by Pakistan's own army. He underscored how the world sees through Pakistan's propaganda and said that Pakistan distracts the world through hyperbole.
"Every year, we are unfortunately fated to listen to the delusional tirade of Pakistan against my country, especially on Jammu and Kashmir, the Indian territory they covet. Our pioneering record on women, peace and security agenda is unblemished and unscathed. A country that bombs its own people, conducts systematic genocide can only attempt to distract the world with misdirection and hyperbole," he said.
Operation Searchlight in 1971
The UN representative further slammed Islamabad for its violation of women's rights and accused it of “misdirecting the world with hyperbole.”
"This is a country that conducted Operation Searchlight in 1971 and sanctioned a systematic campaign of genocidal mass rape of 400,000 women citizens by its own army. The world sees through Pakistan's propaganda", the Indian envoy said.
‘Operation Searchlight’ was a military operation carried out by the Pakistani Army as part of an effort to stop the Bengali nationalist movement in Bangladesh, then East Pakistan.
India's response came to the remarks of Counsellor Saima Saleem, who is part of the Permanent Mission of Pakistan to the United Nations.
What did Counsellor Saima Saleem say?
During her remarks, Saleem discussed the ‘plight’ of Kashmiri women who have been "for decades of occupation have endured sexual violence deployed as a weapon of war."
"UN human rights mechanisms, including the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights and Special Procedures along with organisations such as Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, and Médecins Sans Frontières, have documented these violations," she said.
The UNSC debate on Women, Peace, and Security was held to mark 25 years of Resolution 1325. This UN resolution was adopted in the year 2000 and marked the impact of disproportionate and unique impact of armed conflict on women and girls.
The resolution primarily focuses on preventing violations of women's rights, particularly during conflicts.
"To exclude Kashmiri women from the Women, Peace and Security agenda erases its legitimacy and undermines its universality. The Jammu and Kashmir dispute is on this Council's agenda and therefore, future reports must reflect their plight accordingly," Saleem said.
EAM's dig at Pakistan
Earlier in his address to the UN General Assembly in September, External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar had taken a sharp dig at Pakistan without naming the country.
" India has confronted this challenge since independence, having a neighbour that is an epicentre of global terrorism. For decades now, major international terrorist attacks are traced back to that one country".
(With agency inputs)