India has once again aggressively criticized Pakistan at the United Nations. This time, it was during a high-profile debate at the UN Security Council (UNSC) about the Women, Peace, and Security (WPS) agenda.
At the UNSC Open Debate, India’s Permanent Representative to the UN, Parvathaneni Harish, gave a harsh response to Pakistan’s “delusional tirade” against India, especially when it came to the Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir.
“Every year, we have to listen to Pakistan’s crazy rant against my country, especially about Jammu and Kashmir, which they want to take over,” the Indian envoy said.
India Talks About the 1971 Genocide and Mass Rape
The UN official strongly denied Pakistan’s claims of human rights violations, saying that Islamabad was violating women’s rights and trying to “misdirect the world with hyperbole.”
Ambassador Harish then talked on one of the worst times in South Asian history: Pakistan’s military crackdown on its own people in East Pakistan (now Bangladesh) in 1971.
“This country did Operation Searchlight in 1971 and let its own soldiers carry out a planned campaign of genocidal mass rape of 400,000 women citizens. He went on to say, “The world sees through Pakistan’s lies.”
Pakistan Brings Up the “Plight” of Women in Kashmir
India’s angry reaction was caused by comments made earlier by Saima Saleem, a counselor at the Permanent Mission of Pakistan to the United Nations.
Saleem talked on the “plight” of Kashmiri women in her statement, saying that they have “endured sexual violence deployed as a weapon of war” during decades of occupation.
She said that these breaches, such as structural impunity, harassment of women journalists and human rights defenders, reprisals against female family members of the missing, torture, and pervasive trauma from sexual violence and abuse, have been documented by:
The Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights and Special Procedures are two UN human rights institutions.
Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, and Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) are examples of international organizations.
Saleem further said that “leaving out Kashmiri women from the Women, Peace, and Security agenda makes it less legitimate and less universal.” The Jammu and Kashmir dispute is on this Council’s agenda, therefore future reports must show how bad things are for them.
A little bit of history about Operation Searchlight (1971)
The Pakistani Army started Operation Searchlight on March 25, 1971. It was a planned military operation to stop the Bengali nationalist movement in East Pakistan.
The operation and the nine-month-long Liberation War that followed caused terrible breaches of human rights:
Deaths: Pakistani troops and their allies killed between 300,000 and 3,000,000 Bengali people.
Sexual Violence: An organized campaign of mass murder and genocidal sexual violence led to the rape of between 200,000 and 400,000 Bengali women.
Displacement: The ethnic cleansing caused a huge refugee problem, which led to India’s involvement as almost 10 million Bengali refugees fled to India.
The horrible things that happened contributed to the 1971 Liberation War, which made Bangladesh an independent country.
The 25th Anniversary of UNSC Resolution 1325
The UNSC Open argument on Women, Peace, and Security was organized to honor the 25th anniversary of Resolution 1325. It was the setting for the heated argument. This important resolution, passed in 2000, set the main goals of the WPS agenda, which are:
Recognizes that armed conflict has a special effect on women and girls.
Stresses how important women are to stopping and solving conflicts and fostering peace.
Calls for the protection of women’s rights and the prevention of gender-based violence during conflicts.