SRINAGAR: Hurriyat Conference (G) chairman, Syed Ali Geelani, Friday expressed anguish over Pakistan’s proposal to grant India the Most Favoured Nation status describing it as “expression of submissive policy on the part of Pakistan.”
In a statement issued from New Delhi, Hurriyat (G) chairman said that “this step of Pakistan will be against the sacrifices and sentiments of Kashmiri people and it will also cause irreparable damage to the Kashmir cause.”
“We have never been against the conducive relationship between the two countries, but until Kashmir is not addressed as a core issue and serious efforts are not made to resolve this dispute, trade and other CBM’s will be meaningless and the efforts for trade will not solve the instable and uncertain political environment of the south Asian region,” the Hurriyat (G) chief said.
Geelani said that “besides maintaining its traditional policy of rigidity and stubbornness with respect to Kashmir, India and its forces are committing genocides and war crimes in Jammu and Kashmir and they are also involved in worst kind of human rights violations.”
“In this situation, granting MFN status to India is unacceptable and expression of submissive policy on the part of Pakistan,” he added.
Geelani also said that the traditional policy of Pakistan with regarding to Kashmir doesn’t seem to be stable from a very long time and with this respect some controversial statements are coming from that side.
“Sometimes they are terming the UN resolutions as an only solution to the Kashmir dispute and sometimes they are going to the other extreme by discussing the out of box and four point formulas. Sometimes Kashmir is declared as juggler-vein and core issue whose solution is considered as prerequisite for the other issues and sometimes the Kashmir issue is put on backburner and the less important things are discussed,” Geelani said, adding “By these controversies, not only Kashmiri nation gets anguished and concerned the world community also gets confused in resolving this dispute.”
Saying that people of Kashmir were not against the conducive and favourable relations between India and Pakistan, Geelani maintained “But we have every right to say that where the freedom of 13 million Kashmiris is forcibly suppressed, where more than 7.5 lakh forces have put the entire population under siege and where innocent youth are massacred in a broad-day-light, declaring India as Most Favourd Nation holds no meaning and it can prove as an important diversion in the Pakistan’s Kashmir policy and it can be the step towards putting the Kashmir dispute in cold storage.”
Geelani said that Kashmir is a core issue between the two countries and the other issues “are offshoots of this dispute.”
“Pakistan and its people have also offered precious sacrifices for their brethren in Kashmir and if today India is granted MFN status by Pakistan, it will be an act against the sacred sacrifices of Pakistan and it will seriously affect the Kashmir cause,” Geelani added.

Reader correspondent