Masood condemns unprovoked Indian shelling at LoC, targeting Sharda archaeological site in AJK

He condemned an amendment in the Jammu and Kashmir Development Act

MIRPUR  (Dunya News) – Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK) President Sardar Masood Khan Wednesday strongly condemned the unprovoked shelling by India on the civilian population in the Neelum Valley targeting an archaeological site in Sharda and warned that such cowardly acts and frequent violations of the ceasefire agreement would escalate tension in the region.

In a statement, Sardar Masood, said the Indian Army fired mortar shells on the government-run girls school in the Neelum Valley and destroyed a portion of it. The unprovoked Indian firing from across the Line of Control damaged a residential house completely and destroyed 17 other residential units partially, he added.

He said the Indian occupation troops also attempted to target the site of an ancient Hindu University in Sharda Peeth, which was a highly condemnable act. Earlier on Monday, a civilian was martyred when a landmine laid by the Indian Army had gone off near the Line of Control in Samahani sector.

While describing the unprovoked Indian Army shelling at the LoC as a well thought-out strategy of India, the AJK president said such provocative acts of India were designed to divert the attention of the international community from its illegal actions in illegally occupied Jammu and Kashmir and to hide the worst human rights violations. However, he maintained, that the people of occupied Kashmir were fighting the war of their freedom and the right to self-determination, and the Indian repression and brutalities could not deter them from their heroic struggle.

He condemned an amendment in the Jammu and Kashmir Development Act which gives Indian army an authority to declare any place in IOJK as a strategic area. It would allow the Indian troops to grab that land of Kashmiri people, he said, adding India was following the Israeli and the Nazi models of the previous century by settling Hindus in the occupied territory. He appealed to the people of occupied Kashmir to hold forceful protest against the Indian trap, and expose the Indian conspiracies.

The AJK president also regretted the martyrdom of three Kashmiris in the Rajauri district of occupied Kashmir, and expressed sympathy with the bereaved families. Meanwhile, in an online interview with Advisory Board of Iqbal Institute of Policy Studies President Lt Gen (retd) Haroon Aslam, the AJK president said the unilateral unlawful actions of India in the held territory had invalidated the Simla Accord as India claimed that whatever actions it had taken in the disputed territory of occupied Kashmir were its internal matter.

Kashmiris, he said, had been struggling for their freedom and liberty, and fighting against foreign occupation, colonial rule and alien domination since 1947. Their struggle to end foreign occupation was legitimate under international law and UN charters, he asserted.

Paying tribute to the valiant people of Indian Illegally Occupied Jammu and Kashmir, Masood said the oppressed people of IIOJK were fighting 900,000 strong Indian army with stone and sticks and creating a new history of courage and resilience.