In a sharp retort to Pakistan raising the issue of Jammu and Kashmir in the United Nations Security Council, India has said its neighbour committed genocide in the then East Pakistan,now Bangladesh, and has evaded accountability for such serious crimes.
Presenting India’s stand in the UN Security Council, New Delhi also said Pakistan is a “live example” of how a nation continues to evade accountability for ethnic cleansing.
Making these assertions, Kajal Bhat, Counsellor/Legal Advisor in India’s Permanent Mission in the UN also said late Thursday India will continue to take firm and decisive steps to respond to cross-border terrorism.
The Counsellor said she was constrained to take the floor to respond to some of the falsehoods and malicious propaganda spread by the representative of Pakistan “as they are accustomed to do like a broken record".
"Today, we are discussing how to strengthen accountability and justice for serious violations of international law. The irony is perhaps lost on the representative of Pakistan, given their shameful history of committing genocide in what was then East Pakistan, and what is now Bangladesh, over 50 years back for which there has not even been an acknowledgement, much less apology or accountability,” Bhat said.
Her response came after the representative of Pakistan raised the issue of Jammu and Kashmir at the UN Security Council open debate on “Strengthening accountability and justice for serious violations of international law” chaired by Council President Albania.
Speaking in the Council debate earlier in the day, Minister for State for External Affairs Rajkumar Ranjan Singh had said accountability and justice cannot be linked to political expediencies.
“The representative of Pakistan presents a live example to the Security Council of how a state continues to evade accountability for serious crimes of genocide and ethnic cleansing. To ask them to reflect on this is perhaps asking too much, but the least they could do is not sully the dignity of this Council,” she said.
Bhat said innocent women, children, academics and intellectuals were treated as weapons of war in an act of "calculated genocide, carried out by the Pakistani army” in what it called 'Operation Searchlight'.
“The reign of terror unleashed by Pakistan on the population of the then East Pakistan, saw hundreds of thousands killed brutally, several thousands of women were raped,” she said.
Bhat said the only contribution that Pakistan can make is to stop its support for terrorism directed against India and its people.