( 909 martyred, 107,854 orphaned since January 1989)
Children’s Day 20 November 2022 is an international observance and not a public holiday. All the UN member countries celebrate Children’s’ Day according to their specified dates with a serious message. International Children’s Day offers us an opportunity to promote and celebrate children’s rights that will build a better world for them. Kashmiri children worst victims of Indian state terrorism in IIOJK
The theme for International children’s day is, “Inclusion, for every child”. This theme means that every child belonging to any society, community or nationality is entitled to equal rights. It also emphasizes on the eradication of discrimination among children of various civilizations. Not only the general rights, but a global society welcomes and offers space to children of all types of skin tones. The blue color is the symbol of children’s rights on Children’s Day. You can show your support by turning blue on 20th November
Another vital perspective of the theme is to take a step forward by making a peaceful world that should be more inclusive for our children and it will repel every prejudice. As any biasness is injurious to the harmony of society, it may also put vulnerable effects to the psychology of a child whom a community deems unacceptable or a misfit. Hence, the gravity of any human or natural calamities like wars or Pandemics, should not make our children suffer and we collectively will include the children of all territories in our support or rescue mission. Indian troops in their unabated acts of state terrorism have martyred 915 children during the last thirty-four years in Indian illegally occupied Jammu and Kashmir.
A report released by the Research Section of Kashmir Media Service on the occasion of World Children’s Day, today, the children are the worst victims of India’s illegal occupation of Jammu and Kashmir. It revealed that 915 children are among the 96,154 people martyred by the troops since January 01, 1989, till date. The report said that the killing of civilians by the troops rendered 107,887 children orphaned in the territory during the period
While much of the country has struggled under pandemic-induced lockdowns, Kashmiris have in effect lived with those conditions for a full year. But for most Kashmiris, the stripping of their political autonomy is not a real shock. It is frustrating but not surprising. And that is because most of them were born in a land where young men commonly picked up guns to fight for independence from the Indian state, and they grew up in a region where curfews, military operations, and extrajudicial killings were the order of the day. About 69 percent of the around 12 million people living in Jammu and Kashmir are under the age of 35. Consider the story of Mir Saqib, a 34-year-old entrepreneur who is considering filing for bankruptcy. Unlike the previous generation, which had access to arms, the Kashmiris who came of age in the 2000s had to resort to stones as their weapons of choice? Every Friday, after the afternoon prayers at Srinagar’s main mosque, young men flooded the streets to throw stones at the security forces. Over a period of time this type of protest became merely symbolic. Jammu and Kashmir had a monthly average unemployment rate of 15 percent between January 2016 and July 2019, according to the Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy. This is more than double the national average of 6.4 percent during the same period. It added that over a hundred of persons including 19-month-old Hiba Jan, 4-year-old Zuhra Majeed, 8-year-old Asif Rashid, 8-year-old Owais Ahmad, 10-year-old Asif Ahmad Sheikh and 13-year-old Mir Arafat have lost their eyesight totally and partially due to pellet bullets of Indian forces in the territory during last 12 years. A large number of school boys are among thousands of Kashmiris arrested since the military and police siege when India scrapped the special status of IIOJK in August 2019.
Pakistan has called upon the international community to become the voice of the oppressed Kashmiri children of Indian Occupied Kashmir. In a statement on the occasion of Universal Children Day, the Foreign Office Spokesperson urged India to immediately stop its illegal and inhumane policies and practices that are in contravention of its own obligations under the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child. Pakistan is fully committed to upholding its international and national obligations for the promotion and protection of the rights of the child. Prime Minister’s Office and Ministry of Foreign Affairs are being lit blue as a manifestation of commitment to upholding the child rights. It maintained that conscientious people must raise their voices for the rights of the Kashmiri children, adding that on World Children’s Day, the global community must not forget the plight of the children of IIOJK