UNITED NATIONS: Pakistan has called for addressing ‘horrific’ human rights abuses inflicted by occupation forces on Kashmiris and Palestinians.
“The Palestinian and Kashmiri people continue to suffer horrific human rights violations at the hands of occupying forces while the world continues to watch without addressing these egregious situations,” Pakistan’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations Maleeha Lodhi told the 15-member UN Security Council (UNSC) while speaking in an open debate on tackling challenges to international peace and security.
Maleeha Lodhi said the unresolved disputes of Kashmir and Palestine were compounding the challenges to an already dangerous world beset with wide-ranging new threats as older ones persist.
The envoy deplored the fact that long-standing and internationally-recognized Kashmir and Palestine continue to fester, augmenting “challenges of a more turbulent and volatile world.”
Lodhi said that the drivers of such challenges include unresolved long-standing disputes, foreign military interventions, political and economic injustice, terrorism and violent extremism, and displacement of populations due to persecution, poverty and conflict. What was need was a shift from a culture of reaction to culture of prevention, she said.
The ambassador said there was obviously no one-size-fits-all solution to conflict prevention, adding moving a Country towards durable peace began with a clear understanding of the sources and nature of conflicts.
Noting that more blue helmets were currently deployed than at any time in history, she said that UN peacekeeping has always been a cost-effective tool for the maintenance of international peace and security. But peacekeeping needed to be strengthened through support for political solutions that would make peace durable and sustainable.
In this context, Maleeha Lodhi outlined a set of suggestions to address the complex contemporary challenges to peace and security. They include dealing with the root causes of conflict; shifting from emphasis on military action to negotiation; national ownership and leadership; better utilization of Chapter VI of the UN Charter – ‘negotiation, enquiry, mediation, conciliation, arbitration, judicial settlement, resort to regional agencies or arrangements, or other peaceful means’; and shaping the UN peacekeeping by the situation on ground, not by the often competing political interests.
“Proliferation of conflicts today is a clear sign of the need for urgent action,” the Pakistani envoy said. “Fundamental change in the way we deal with conflicts is required.”
