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This is an archive article published on May 27, 1997

NC dancing to Army tune, says Hurriyat

CALCUTTA, May 26: The chairman of the Jammu and Kashmir People's Conference, Abdul Ghani Lone said in a press conference here today that th...

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CALCUTTA, May 26: The chairman of the Jammu and Kashmir People’s Conference, Abdul Ghani Lone said in a press conference here today that the Indian Army “is ruling Jammu and Kashmir in the name of the puppet National Conference Government.”

The All Party Hurriyat Conference (APHC) leaders including Yasin Malik, who were in the city in connection with their national-level campaign to focus on “human rights violation in the state by the Army,” in a statement said, “Now it is the Indian Government which is coming in the way of the Kashmiri people’s right to self-determination.”

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Stating that the 1996 elections were a farce, Malik, a top Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF) leader, said atrocities being committed by the Army in the State had reached such a point that it now called for national condemnation.

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Malik said that after the elections, there were reports of “rapes, killings of innocents by the Indian Army” which “puppet Chief Minister Farooq Abdullah was ignored.”

When reminded that Amnesty International’s reports on several occasions had put the blame on Kashmiri terrorists for the gross violations in human rights in the state, Malik said, “The renegade elements are carrying out the killings of innocent people and freedom fighters are getting the blame.”

The APHC leaders also described reports of the Pakistan government sending trained extremists into Kashmir as a myth, saying that in the real sense, “they are freedom fighters struggling for independence.”

On his part, Lone said that before the situation went out of hand, the Indian Government should sit down with the Hurriyat leaders and Pakistan to settle the dispute and allow the people of Kashmir to exercise their right to self-determination.

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