By EuAsiaNews,
Brussels : A Dutch NGO is appealing to the European Union and to the United States not to forget the issue of Kashmir as the focus of the international community has shifted on AfPak (Afghanistan-Pakistan).
“Kashmir seems not to be on the agenda in Brussels. The debate is not on Kashmir but on AfPak,” Marjan Lucas a spokesperson for the IKV Pax-Christi told a news briefing in Brussels.
“It is important that Kashmiris come on focus. If you don’t keep Kashmir on the agenda then there will always be something that trigger emotions which will make any strategy to create stability not function,” stated Lucas who is responsible for the Kashmir and Pakistan desk at the Dutch NGO which recently published a 100-page report on the Jammu and Kashmir state assembly elections held in 2008.
The report concludes that “India portrays Jammu&Kashmir state elections as democratic , but many Kashmiris and foreign observers, have serious doubts and say that that in the given context the elections can never be claimed as free and fair.”
Lucas also claimed that the Kashmir issue is an “international problem” arguing that the subject
has been debated in the European Parliament which has issued its own report on Kashmir.
Pax-Christi has sent a letter to US special envoy Richard Holbrooke appealing to keep Kashmir on the radar. It has also sent a letter to J&K chief minister , Omar Abdullah, urging him to invest his efforts “in democracy and in economy.”
Pax-Christi, based in the Dutch city of Utrecht, says it is a civil society organisation working for peace and justice worldwide.
“We got involved in Kashmir after being invited in 2000 by the India-Pakistan Movement against nuclear proliferation. The notion of “Kashmir as the Nuclear Flashpoint” brought us to Kashmir,” claims the Dutch NGO.