Srinagar
Jammu and Kashmir Democratic Freedom Party while reiterating its call for urgent release of all illegally detained Hurriyat leaders and activists has made a passionate appeal to the international community to help release Kashmiri detainees from India’s jam-packed prisons amid high risk of coronavirus transmission.
A DFP spokesman in a statement issued in Srinagar on Monday said that since India’s packed prisons have raised COVID-19 alarm there was a dire need that India should release all unjustly detained Kashmiris.
Reminding India of its international rights obligations, the spokesman said that as per the international covenants New Delhi was duty bound to protect prisoners. He said that keeping detainees in the overcrowded prisons, which have emerged as potential infection hot spots was tantamount to endanger prisoners’ lives.
He said dozens of top-ranking Hurriyat leaders including Shabbir Ahmed Shah, Muhammad Yasin Malik and Aasiya Andrabi languishing in Tihar Jail were being made to suffer just for championing the Kashmiris’ just cause of right to self-determination.—SABAH
