Disallowing seminar on rights violations disputes claims on democracy: JRL

Srinagar: Joint Resistance Leadership (JRL) on Saturday dubbed as “state terrorism” the disallowing of a seminar by the administration.
In a statement, the JRL comprising Syed Ali Geelani, Mirwaiz Umar Farooq and Yasin Malik said: “At a time when the world was observing Human Rights Day, however administration is reluctant to allow peaceful programme and forces in Kashmir are committing massive violations of human rights (sic).”
The seminar titled “human rights violations and criminal silence maintained by international community’’ was supposed to be attended by resistance leadership including prominent speakers and scholars, who were invited by Joint leadership to share their views on the topic, said the statement.
“Since Saturday morning, all the roads leading to the venue in Hyderpora locality on the outskirts of Srinagar, were blocked by police personnel where many activists and journalists were turned away. Police placed Syed Ali Geelani and Mirwaiz Dr Umer Farooq under house arrest while as police raided residence of Mohammad Yasin Malik.”
In the morning, a heavy contingent of police was deployed outside Geelani’s Hyderpora residence — the venue for the seminar and they also put several Hurriyat leaders under house detention to foil the seminar.
The leadership termed the government action as “state terrorism” saying it has proved that their tall claims about democracy are hoax.
In the statement, the joint leadership said that although UNO has formulated a charter in 1947 to safeguard basic rights pertaining to nations, however this institution failed to provide and secure these cherished rights.