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Arab News
13-07-2025
- Politics
- Arab News
Pakistan vows political, diplomatic support for Kashmiris on Kashmir Martyrs' Day
ISLAMABAD: Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif on Sunday vowed to extend Pakistan's diplomatic and political support to the people of Kashmir on Kashmir Martyrs' Day, calling for the resolution of the dispute as per the United Nations Security Council resolutions, state-run media reported. Pakistan marks Kashmir Martyrs' Day on July 13 every year to pay tribute to 22 Kashmiri protesters who were shot dead in Srinagar, the capital of Indian-administered Kashmir, in 1931 by soldiers of Maharaja Hari Singh, the Hindu ruler of the then princely state. Pakistan sees the day as a symbol of Kashmiris' struggle against what it says is illegal Indian occupation in the disputed Himalayan valley. Both India and Pakistan have fought three wars since 1947, with two of them over Kashmir. Both claim territory in full but administer only parts of it. 'The Kashmiri people have been and are sacrificing their lives in their legitimate struggle for the right to self-determination,' Sharif was quoted as saying by the Associated Press of Pakistan (APP). 'The government of Pakistan expresses its political, diplomatic and moral support in solidarity with the Muslims of Jammu and Kashmir, which is illegally occupied by India.' Every year on the occasion, special rallies, seminars, and conferences are held across Pakistan and Azad Kashmir to express solidarity with the people of Kashmir. India accuses Pakistan of backing separatist militants in the part of Kashmir it administers. Islamabad denies the allegations and says it only extends political and diplomatic support to Kashmiris. The two countries engaged in the worst fighting between them in decades in May when gunmen shot dead 26 people, mostly tourists, in Indian-administered Kashmir. India blamed Pakistan for supporting the attack, which Pakistan strongly denied and called for an international probe into the incident. The two countries engaged in a military conflict for four days that killed over 70 people on both sides of the border before US President Donald Trump announced a ceasefire between Delhi and Islamabad on May 10.
ABC News
12-05-2025
- Politics
- ABC News
Why are India and Pakistan fighting?
Fighting between Pakistan and India flared up over the weekend, with a ceasefire broken just hours after it was declared. The violence is a continuation of decades of hostility between the neighbouring countries. Here's a brief explanation of where the conflict began. Because of a decades-long dispute over land in an area referred to as the Kashmir region. It's a region near the northernmost corners of India and Pakistan. Many people just call it Kasmir, but on many maps, you will see the region labelled as Jammu and Kashmir. This goes back to the days when it was a princely state of Jammu and Kashmir — more on that below. To understand the dispute, we have to go back to the days of the British Indian Empire. This massive area included the land that makes up the countries we now know as India and Pakistan. Britain's control of the area ended in August, 1947 and the empire was split into India, Bangladesh and Pakistan. India was a Hindu majority, while Pakistan was Muslim majority. But the fate of Jammu and Kashmir — then a princely state — was left undecided. The region was majority Muslim but its ruler, Maharaja Hari Singh, was Hindu. He was given a choice about whether to join India or Pakistan or remain independent. Before he could decide, the local uprisings and an invasion from tribal groups that Maharaja Singh accused the Pakistani government of backing, led to him seeking help from the Indian government, which was only offered on the condition he cede to India. He signed the Instrument of Accession to India in October, 1947. Fighting escalated over the coming months, with the war eventually ending with a UN-brokered ceasefire in April, 1948. The idea was to stop the fighting so the people could vote on whether the region would become part of India or Pakistan — but this never happened. A boundary called the Ceasefire Line — now known as the Line of Control — was established, which divided the region without technically being classified as an international border. The map included in UN documents from 1949 is difficult to read but, in a nutshell, Pakistan administered the land on the north west, while India administered land on the south east. Hostilities between the two nations continued over the decades. Fighting intensified again in 1965, continuing for months until a ceasefire was brokered by what was then known as the Soviet Union. Both sides agreed to adhere to the original ceasefire line from the late 1940s. Fighting flared up again in 1971, ending with the signing of a peace treaty in 1972. And in 1999, India and Pakistani forces clashed again in the Kargil region in what was described as an undeclared war. Here's what the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) says about the region on its website about Australia's relationship with Pakistan: "The Kashmir region is disputed with India. "Pakistan-administered Kashmir comprises Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK) and Gilgit-Baltistan." However, DFAT's page on India makes no mention of the Kashmir region. Here's some of what a DFAT report on India from 2023 says about the region: "The situation in Jammu and Kashmir is not always clear. "Remoteness, government restrictions and low-grade technology (for example, 2G mobile phone service and other limitations that are also related to the remoteness of the region) limit available information. "Internet is sometimes shut down by authorities, ostensibly for security reasons to prevent organising of violence." The federal government's SmartTraveller website updated its warnings telling people to avoid the area over the weekend. Here's what it says: "Due to the current security situation between India and Pakistan, we recommend you monitor local media, stay alert, take official warnings seriously and follow the advice of local authorities." It goes on to say: "We continue to advise do not travel to the Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir, the entire India-Pakistan border area, and Manipur. This doesn't apply to the Union Territory of Ladakh. India has closed the Attari border crossing with Pakistan." ABC/wires
CBC
08-05-2025
- Politics
- CBC
What led up to the current conflict between India and Pakistan?
The recent violence between India and Pakistan marks a major resurgence in the fight over the long-disputed region of Kashmir, a popular tourist destination that lies at the foothills of the Himalayas at the northern tip of the Indian subcontinent. India fired missiles into the Pakistani province of Punjab and Pakistan-run Kashmir in several locations Wednesday, killing at least 26 in what Pakistan's leader called an act of war. India said it was striking infrastructure used by militants linked to last month's killing of at least 26 tourists in India-administered Kashmir. India has blamed Pakistan for backing the tourist attack, a claim Pakistani officials deny. Kenneth MacDonald, human geography professor at the University of Toronto, says Kashmir has long been divided by caste, class and religion. But the land dispute stems from the 1947 partition, when India and Pakistan gained independence from Britain. 'Line of Control' established in 1940s During the partition, semi-autonomous states across the region were being granted to India and Pakistan. At the time, Maharaja Hari Singh was ruler of the state of Jammu and Kashmir. He chose for the state to join Hindu-majority India, despite having a majority Muslim population in line with Pakistan. The 1947-48 war saw Pakistan gain control of roughly one-third of the larger region of Kashmir, and led to a heavily militarized ceasefire border in the middle called the "Line of Control." Today, both countries claim all of Kashmir, but each controls a section of the territory on either side of the Line of Control, which is not a legally recognized internationally boundary. WATCH | The events that led to the current India-Pakistan conflict: What brought India and Pakistan to the brink of war — again 2 days ago Duration 7:05 Armed insurgents in India-run Kashmir have resisted Indian rule, and some Muslim Kashmiris support either bringing the region completely under Pakistani rule or becoming an independent country. MacDonald says there have been many "skirmishes" over the territory since, escalating into full-fledged wars in 1965, 1971 and 1999. But after escalations of political violence through the 1980s and '90s, Pakistan in 2002 began blocking Kashmiri fighters from entering India and banning extremist groups. "The Pakistani government went to great lengths to put a stop to that in 2002-03, and was relatively successful," MacDonald told CBC News. However, "periodic outbursts" continued, notably with significant attacks in 2008, 2016 and 2019, causing drawn-out violence. Indian prime minister stoked anger in 2019 Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi revoked India-administered Kashmir's special status in 2019 — which had granted it limited autonomy — and his Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) instituted new rules allowing outsiders to buy land in the territory. Both moves angered many Kashmiri residents. MacDonald does not believe Pakistan was involved in the recent tourist attack, which singled out non-Muslims, saying the country "has next to nothing to gain" from supporting insurgents killing civilians in India. But Modi, whose popularity in India is floundering, nonetheless wants to "look strong" in addressing the attack, he said. The latest escalation from India is seen as especially serious in part because it has moved beyond villages on either side of the border, with India attacking in Punjab, which MacDonald describes as "the heartland of Pakistan." Michael Kugelman, a Washington-based South Asia analyst and writer for the Foreign Policy magazine, says a sizeable Pakistani response can be expected, given the scale of India's strike. "We've had a strike and a counter-strike, and what comes next will be the strongest indication of just how serious a crisis this could become," he said. Countries including the United States have helped contain past conflicts in the region, fearing the consequences of escalation between the nuclear-armed nations. But some are concerned that the current U.S. administration under Donald Trump, which has taken a more isolationist approach, won't serve as a deterrent like in the past. Trump called the escalating conflict between India and Pakistan "so terrible" on Wednesday and urged both sides to stop the violence.
