JKLF UK executive and working committee held in Watford

(London) The UK chapter of the pro-independence Jammu Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF), in its extra ordinary meeting of the executive and working committee held in Watford near London, has warned of dire consequences if JKLF leaders arrested during the ‘jail bharo’ movement are not released immediately without charge along with many other Kashmiri activists who were sentenced earlier in the month under the draconian laws and framed up charges from 20 years back.  

In a press statement released from London, the JKLF announced that their members will start picketing Indian missions in UK and Europe including embassies and consulates to draw the world attention to the plight of Kashmiri prisoners in J&K and in Indian prisons.

The JKLF statement said that Kashmir has become a police state where freedom of expression and freedom of speech is dealt with long prison sentences and where men, women and small children are imprisoned because they demand their right to freedom and independence.  Instead of punishing the 500 army and security forces personnel who have been named in the latest report as the perpetrators of human rights violations including, rape, molestation, kidnapping and extrajudicial killings, the Indian and state authorities continue to punish innocent people belonging to many different pro-freedom organisations.  During the 3 hour long meeting, JKLF leaders expressed hope that Indian civil society seems to have woken up in Delhi over the case of  a student rape and needed to pay urgent attention to what was happening in Kashmir.

“Our demand is simple that all political prisoners should be released immediately and the draconian laws that prevent people from protesting against injustices and atrocities must be withdrawn.

“JKLF is not just a name but it’s a face of the revolutionary movement, and each one of its leaders and workers is committed to the cause of national independence and if Indian and state authorities think that they will be able to supress our movement by imprisoning and awarding long sentences to freedom fighters, they have to think again”, the JKLF leaders said.

JKLF delegates including the office bearers from London, Luton, Watford, Slough, Bedford, Peterborough, Birmingham, Nottingham, Derby, Stoke, Walsall, Manchester, Oldham and Bradford attended the meeting and condemn the Indian action in Kashmir. During the meeting an action plan was drawn up for coming months to draw world attention to the plight of Kashmir.

JKLF president Azmat Khan, told the meeting that international diplomatic and political pressures was needed, urged members to contact their members of UK and European Parliament to apprise them of  the latest situation in Kashmir.  He said that he was going to raise the issue with international human rights organizations and the UN Human Rights Council. He said, that he was hopeful that Pakistani mission in the UN would draw the attention of the international community towards the dire situation in Indian occupied Kashmir during the forthcoming UN Security Council meeting where the Syrian situation is to be debated. 

On 3rd December, 2012, a kangaroo court in Jammu awarded life sentences to two Kashmiris Sheikh Nazir Ahmed and Shoukat Ahmed, who had both spent nearly 15 years in Indian jails without trial after being arrested in 1990s. They were released on bail over 7 years ago but rearrested recently and awarded life imprisonment.    

JKLF has launched a five phase “Jail Baro Tahreek (Court Arrest Movement)” in Indian Occupied Kashmir against life sentencing of Kashmiri prisoners, death sentences and subjecting them to the worst kind of torture. So far Indian authorities in Kashmir have arrested over 100 prominent figures of the prominent figures of JKLF including Chairman Mohammad Yasin Malik, Bashir Ahmed Butt, S M Afzal, Showkat Ahmad Bakshi, Mr.Khawaja Abdul Majid Wani, Zahoor Ahmed Butt, Javed Ahmed Mir, Mushtaq Ahmad Khan, Mohammad Ishaq Ganai (President Islamabad District), Abdul Sattar (president of District kulgam), Rafiq ahmad war (district president Kupwara), Abdul Rashid Magloo (district president Baramulla) along with families of Kashmiri prisoners and prominent figures of Human rights organizations.

Press Secretary,

JKLF – UK

Email: info@jklf.co.uk