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Madam Chair,
I would like to begin by congratulating you on your election as the Chair of the Special Political and Decolonization Committee.
My delegation aligns with the NAM statement.
Madam Chair,
Peacekeeping is the most vivid manifestation of the Charter’s concept of collective security.
Over the last six decades, Pakistani peacekeepers have operated effectively in some of the most challenging environments due to high morale, discipline, rich experience and training.
The upcoming Ministerial Conference in the Republic of Korea next December will be an excellent opportunity to enhance and modernize UN peacekeeping.
Pakistan intends to make concrete pledges in peacekeeping technology and medical capacity, besides offering infantry, aviation, force protection, engineering units, signal companies, FPU’s and community engagement platoons.
Excellency,
The protection of peacekeeping personnel is a priority. It requires adequate resources, well trained peacekeeping personnel to field operations.
Next week, together with the Netherlands, Pakistan will host a peacekeeping ministerial meeting on ‘safety and security and protection’.
Pakistan welcomes the growing focus on technology to improve the safety and security of peacekeepers. The use of modern technology to strengthen camp security, convoy movement, telemedicine, intelligence and field communications can also enhance the peacekeeping performance.
Our premier peacekeeping training institute, the Center for International Peace and Stability (CIPS), continues to train peacekeepers from around the world in such areas as: leadership, gender, protection of civilians and community engagement among others.
Pakistan will leverage the UN sponsored partnership frameworks, such as Triangular Partnership Program and Light Coordination Mechanism, to improve training and respond to the field related capabilities of emerging TCC’s. Our continued engagement with the African Union will remain a central part of this effort.
As the Secretary-General A4P + initiative stipulates, peacekeeping is most effective when it is supported by an overall political strategy. Considerable work needs to be done in this context. The Security Council has been unable to develop political solutions to several old and new disputes across the world including the Jammu and Kashmir dispute, where one of the oldest UN Missions, the United Nations Military Observer Group in India and Pakistan (UNMOGIP), is stationed.
Excellency,
Pakistan welcomes the recommendations of the Special Committee contained in its report A/76/23 requesting the Secretary General to explore innovative ways of using his good offices to advance the decolonization agenda.
Eradicating colonialism is part of the unfinished agenda of the United Nations. Since 1946, 80 former colonies have gained independence. But there are still peoples who are denied the right to self- determination, most prominently the people of Palestine and Jammu & Kashmir.
Mr. Chairman,
Durable peace in the Middle East can only be achieved through the two-state solution and the establishment of a viable, independent and contiguous State of Palestine, with the pre-1967 borders, with Al-Quds Al-Sharif as its capital. In the meantime, the world must continue to extend all possible social, economic and humanitarian assistance to the Palestinians, including the Palestinian refugees through the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA).
Madam Chair,
The Indian occupation of Jammu & Kashmir is the worst manifestation of modern-day colonialism. The Declaration on Decolonization proclaims that ‘all people’ have the right to self-determination. The founding fathers of the United Nations expressly acknowledged the primacy of this right by placing it in the very first article of the UN Charter. It is also the core right contained in Common Article II of the UN Conventions on Civil and Political Rights and Economic and Social Rights. In case of Jammu and Kashmir, this right was further sanctified by the UN Security Council which are prescribed in several resolutions that the final disposition of the state should be decided by its people through a free and fair plebiscite held under UN auspices.
The Declaration on Decolonization also decrees that the subjection of people to alien subjugation, domination and exploitation is contrary to the Charter of the United Nations. Kashmir today is the most densely occupied place in the world, with 900,000 Indian occupation troops, deployed in a region the size of Belgium, with one Indian soldier for every 7 Kashmiri man, woman and child.
India has imprisoned the entire Kashmiri leadership, illegally detained thousands of Kashmiri youth, including women and children, put down protests violently, and destroyed entire neighborhoods and villages as “collective punishment”. It has locked down the internet and locked out impartial observers from occupied Kashmir.
Even the dead are not immune from India’s brutal behavior. The iconic Kashmiri leader Syed Ali Shah Geelani, died last month after years under Indian detention. His body was snatched from his family, whisked away and buried hurriedly in a non-descript place, denying his family the right to the prescribed Islamic burial rites. This is not only a measure of Indian tyranny but also its fear of the free voice of the Kashmiri people.
Since its illegal attempt to annex Jammu and Kashmir since 5 August 2019, India has launched what its fascist regime ominously calls the final solution by seeking to change Kashmir’s demography from a Muslim majority state to a Hindu majority territory. Over 3.4 million fake domicile certificates have been issued to Hindu outsiders to settle in Kashmir, arbitrarily seizing the land and properties of the Kashmiris. This surely amounts to genocide.
Pakistan urges this august forum which is charged with ending colonialization and implementing the 1960 Declaration on Decolonization calls for action by the Security Council to end India’s colonialization of occupied Jammu and Kashmir and enable its people to exercise their recognized right to self-determination.
I thank you!