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LAHORE, Feb 5: Political parties belonging to the right, left and centre sunk their differences on Wednesday to reiterate their unflinching support to the freedom struggle going on in occupied Kashmir, expressing the belief that time was not far away when the liberation movement would succeed and the Kashmiris get their UN-guaranteed right to self-determination.
The PML(Q) expressed solidarity with the Kashmiri people by holding a public meeting at the Muslim League House under the chairmanship of Chief Minister Chaudhry Pervaiz Elahi.
The place had countless banners inscribed with slogans in favour of the rights of Kashmiris and against the brutalities being perpetrated by Indian forces in the occupied Kashmir. Women, including legislators, were present in large numbers.
The MMA, PML(N), PPP(Patriots) and Kashmiri organizations organized separate rallies and other programmes to mark the day.
The Punjab PML(Q), through a resolution, urged the world community to take steps for the implementation of UN resolutions on Kashmir.
The participants also resolved to continue political, moral and diplomatic support for the freedom movement.
They called upon the United Nations to take steps to bring an end to state terrorism in the occupied Kashmir and asked it to take notice of humiliation of women and custodial torture and killing.
Chaudhry Pervaiz Elahi said time was fast approaching when India would have no option but to negotiate the dispute with Pakistan.
He said war was no solution to any problem and it had failed to settle the dispute.
The chief minister said the people of India would soon ask their leaders why they were wasting billions every year on defence and suppression of the freedom movement when those funds could be utilized in social sectors.
Chaudhry Pervaiz said Kashmir was like a jugular vein for Pakistan and the country could not survive without it, adding that independence of Pakistan would be incomplete unless people of Kashmir also got independence from Indian occupation.
Referring to elections in occupied Kashmir, the chief minister said they were a farce as the electorate had not participated in them.
He said the Indian government would not be able to control the renewed desire for independence among the people of occupied Kashmir.
The people of Pakistan, he said, would extend all possible assistance to the Kashmiri people to enable them to get their rights, which the United Nations had promised them long ago.
PML(Q) leaders Arshad Khan Lodhi, Kamil Ali Agha, Akhtar Rasool, Dr Ferzana Nazir, Faqir Husain Bukhari, Aslam Sindhu, Akram Gill, Nasim Lodhi, Mubashir Waraich and Shahbaz Goshi also spoke on the occasion. S.M. Zafar, Begum Mehnaz Rafi, Mian Meraj Din, Saeedul Haq Siddiqui and Khwaja Riaz Mahmood were prominent among the participants.
PML-N: Led by Khwaja Saad Rafiq, Zulfikar Khosa, Tehmina Daultana and Prof Sajid Mir, PML-N activists held a rally from Nila Gumbad to Regal Chowk.
The PML-N leaders said it was Nawaz Sharif who had started observing Feb 5 as solidarity day with the Kashmiris.
Urging the army to transfer complete power to civilian set-up, they said only a political government could solve the issue.
They said Gen Pervez Musharraf was calling the shots in the country as Prime Minister Zafarullah Jamali was only a puppet.
MMA: The Muttahida Majlis Amal took out a rally from Nasser Bagh.
Led by Jamaat-i-Islami general secretary Syed Munawwar Hasan, MMA central leader Hafiz Husain Ahmad, JUP’s Qari Zawwar Bahadur, Maulana Amjad Khan and others, the participants marched up to the Regal Chowk on The Mall where they held a public meeting.
The rally was to terminate at the Chairing Cross but it stopped short of its destination as the place had been occupied by schoolchildren wearing military uniforms.
The demonstrators, including women, were carrying banners and placards inscribed with slogans like “Down with India,” “End atrocities on Kashmiris,” “Give Kashmiris right to franchise.”
Speaking on the occasion, the speakers said that the nation was offering sacrifices for the Kashmir cause for the last 54 years and it would not allow the rulers to put the issue on the back burner.
They told proponents of dialogue that India would never come to the negotiating table for the purpose and only a decisive war could solve the problem.
They said both the countries had fought three wars on the issue but these remained indecisive. They urged the nation to be ready for combating the fourth and a decisive war that would result in the accession of Kashmir to Pakistan.
They denied the government claim that Iraq had not supported Pakistan on the Kashmir issue and said that the statement had been given to prepare ground for siding with the United States during its attack on Baghdad.
Mr Javed said Indian Hindus were committing atrocities on Kashmiris as well as on Sikhs. He said the Sikh community would fully support the cause of the Kashmiris.
Another Sikh, Gyan Singh, recited a poem highlighting the plight of the Kashmiris under the Indian rule.
PAT: The Pakistan Awami Tehrik also held a rally from the Press Club up to the Punjab Assembly hall.
The demonstrators, most of them women and children, were carrying placards and raising slogans against Indian oppression in held Kashmir.
The demonstrators, led by PAT women wing chief Humaira Rashid, Rafia Ali and Sidra Gilani, burnt an Indian flag on the Mall.
JKLF: The Jammu Kashmir Liberation Front set up a camp at the Chairing Cross to highlight the Kashmir cause. Syed Faisal Nazki regretted that indifference and apathy of the world towards the plight of the Kashmiris had encouraged India to intensify atrocities on innocent people there.
SMALLER PARTIES: The Almi Tanzim Ahle Sunnat, the Mustafvi Tehrik Pakistan, the Almi Jamaat Ahle Sunnat, and the Minority Front for Equal Rights also held rallies against the India occupation of Kashmir.
The Front urged Washington as well as Pope John Paul to intervene and ensure peace in the region by solving the Kashmir problem.
