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Ethnic nationalities join hands
WSn Network
 New
Delhi- To strengthen the spirit of cooperation and to build
effective coordination among the constituent units, an interim
coordination committee was formed at a meeting of leaders and
representatives of organizations from
Kashmir,
Punjab
and the North-east, which was attended among others by JKLF chairman
Yasin Malik and presided by Justice Retd. Ajit Singh Bains. This
committee has been formed as a result of the continuing
deliberations starting with the seminar on rights of ethnic
nationalities held in
Chandigarh on 8th
December 2007 which was organized by Dal Khalsa and attended by JKLF,
APHC, NPMHR and PHRO. The decision was announced jointly by Prof S A
R Geelani and Kanwarpal Singh at a press conference held at press
club.
The first
members of the interim committee are Prof. S. A. R. Geelani of
Society for Protection of Detainees and Prisoners Rights, Sheikh
Abdul Aziz, Executive Member (APHC), Mohammed Ashraf Lone, Adv. Head
Human Rights Wing of All Party Hurriyat Conference (APHC), Er.
Ghulam Rasool Dar, General Secretary, Jammu and Kashmir Liberation
Front (JKLF), Navkiran Singh Advocate of Lawyers for Human Rights
International and Kanwarpal Singh, general secretary of Dal Khalsa.
Representatives of the Naga and
Assam groups
will be included in the committee in due course.
 After extensive
deliberations on the civil and political rights situation in the
respective areas, a number of decisions were taken and it was
resolved to expand the scope of the committee to include members
from the North-east and other regional groups and movements
struggling for peoples' rights.
Since the last
six decades, various ethnic nationalities have been encountering
repressive policies of the Indian state and all these groups have
resolved to resist the same in a united manner.
The following resolutions were unanimously passed:
1. All
political prisoners in
Kashmir,
Punjab,
and the north-east as well as others parts of the country must be
released.
2. The
Armed Forces Special Powers Act, the Disturbed Areas Act and other
anti-people legislation should be withdrawn from
Kashmir,
North-east and
Punjab.
3. The
meeting urged the Indian state to abolish death penalty from the
statute. Pending the abolition of capital punishment, the death
sentences of all prisoners, including political prisoners like
Mohammed Afzal, Devinder Pal Singh Bhullar, Jagtar Singh Hawara and
Balwant Singh should be commuted to life imprisonment. Those
prisoners, who are on the death row for an unreasonably long time,
should be released immediately.
4.
Widespread impunity and discretion granted to the army and the
police, which has played havoc with human rights of people in
respective areas, -in individual cases as well as gross abuse of
peoples together, should be withdrawn.
5. The
interim Committee, in one of its first decisions, sent greetings to
the people of Kosovo who were able to declare their independence
after a century of subjugation and oppression.
6. The
meeting also condemned the oppression of Tibetans in
Lhasa by the
Chinese police and military forces and urged the international
community to intervene to uphold the rights of the people of
Tibet.
26
March 2008
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