British Foreign Office expresses concern for deteriorating human rights situation in Kashmir

London, 16th December, 1997

The UK government has assured JKLF in London that it continues to monitor the human rights situation in Kashmir, which, it said remains a cause of concern.

The British foreign & Commmonwealth Office, responding to a JKLF plea for intervention over the latest arrests of senior Liberation Front leaders and APHC workers in Srinagar stated that "the human rights situation in Kashmir remains a cause for concern", and that "the British High Commission in Delhi continues to monitor developments there closely".

The JKLF secretary general had written to the British foreign secretary Robin Cook, drawing his attention to the fact that state repression had gone on the increase since his last visit to India. He had sought for UK intervention on humanitarian grounds to have Kashmiri prisoners released.

Mr Robin Cook had met the JKLF chairman Yasin Malik during his tour of Srinagar in 1996 as the shadow foreign secretary. Yasin Malik, along with several of his senior colleagues and workers of the APHC were imprisoned on 4th November 1996, for the sixth time in this year and have not been charged for any offences as yet. He is detained in the Sriganar Central jail where his health has reportedly deteriorated.

The UK foreign office letter, quoting a policy statement from Derek Fatchett, the minister with responsibility for South Asia, said that he had made it clear to the Indian government that the British government was committed to human rights and had 'urged an improvement in the human rights situation in Kashmir'. Ends