ISLAMABAD: Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi has said the recent statement of Genocide Watch founding president and chairman Dr Gregory Stanton regarding Muslims’ genocide in India is endorsement of Pakistan’s stance and viewpoint.

Pakistan had expressed its concerns over the matter at several international forums, but the situation was further deteriorating in the Indian Illegally Occupied Jammu and Kashmir (IIOJ&K), said FM Qureshi in a statement issued on Friday.

He said Muslims were being maltreated not just in the occupied territory but entire India. “Whatever happened in Gujarat and Delhi is before everybody,” he said.

Pakistan had already presented irrefutable evidence regarding Indian involvement in acts of terrorism inside Pakistan, Mr Qureshi said in reference to the dossier released last week.

Earlier on Tuesday, the founder of Genocide Watch — a global organisation dedicated to the prevention of genocide — while speaking at a panel discussion organised by the Indian American Muslim Council (IAMC) on 10 Stages of Genocide & India’s Muslims had said genocide was more than killing people. “It is also causing serious physical and mental harm to members of the group. That is intended to destroy the group. Driving them out. Not to let them have food or water and lot of other basics. Taking away children of the group. Preventing births within the group. We see all these things already happening in Kashmir. These types of killings going on in Kashmir are genocide in nature. Why are the 600,000 Indian troops in Kashmir? This is for a very small population compared to rest of India. And yet why are there?”

Published in Dawn, November 21st, 2020