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A Kashmiri child sees an Indian paramilitary soldier erecting a barricade in Srinagar.
A Kashmiri child sees an Indian paramilitary soldier erecting a barricade in Srinagar. Photograph: Farooq Khan/EPA
A Kashmiri child sees an Indian paramilitary soldier erecting a barricade in Srinagar. Photograph: Farooq Khan/EPA

Pakistan to expel Indian high commissioner over Kashmir changes

This article is more than 4 years old

Imran Khan says he is afraid India will carry out ethnic cleansing in disputed territory

Pakistan will expel the Indian high commissioner and suspend trade after suggesting its rival could carry out ethnic cleansing in Kashmir, where tensions remain high following Delhi’s decision to revoke the state’s special status and divide it in two.

Amid an unprecedented communications blackout in Kashmir, the Indian government announced on Monday that it would dramatically change its relationship with the state, revoking the special status that the territory was granted in exchange for joining the Indian union after independence in 1947. It also said it would divide the state in two.

The move has sparked fierce rhetoric from Pakistan, which also claims Kashmir and has fought two wars with India over the territory, with the country’s army chief vowing to “go to any extent” to stand by Kashmiris.

In a statement on Wednesday, Pakistan said it would cut bilateral trade and raise the issue with the UN. Analysts point out trade between the two countries is relatively small and that it is unlikely the UN will take any action.

“The diplomatic statements on their own mean really nothing,” said Raja Mohan, the director of the Institute of South Asian Studies at the National University of Singapore. “It’s really what happens on the ground that will be far more consequential.

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Kashmir

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Who controls Kashmir?

The region in the foothills of the Himalayas has been under dispute since India and Pakistan came into being in 1947.

Both claim it in full, but each controls a section of the territory, separated by one of the world's most heavily militarised borders: the ‘line of control’ based on a ceasefire border established after a 1947-48 war. China controls another part in the east.

India and Pakistan have gone to war a further two times over Kashmir, most recently in 1999. Artillery, mortar and small arms fire are still frequently exchanged.

How did the dispute start?

After the partition of colonial India in 1947, small, semi-autonomous ‘princely states’ across the subcontinent were being folded into India or Pakistan. The ruler of Kashmir dithered over which to join until tribal fighters entered from Pakistan intent on taking the region for Islamabad.

Kashmir asked Delhi for assistance, signing a treaty of accession in exchange for the intervention of Indian troops, who fought the Pakistanis to the modern-day line of control.

In 1948, the UN security council called for a referendum in Kashmir to determine which country the region would join or whether it would become an independent state. The referendum has never been held.

In its 1950 constitution, India granted Kashmir a large measure of independence. But since then it has eroded some of that autonomy and repeatedly intervened to rig elections and dismiss and jail democratically elected leaders.

What was Kashmir’s special status?

Kashmir’s special status, given in exchange for joining the Indian union, had been in place since 14 May 1954. Under article 370, the state was given a separate constitution, a flag, and autonomy over all matters except for foreign affairs and defence. 

An additional provision, article 35a, prevented people from outside the state buying land in the territory. Many Kashmiris believed this was crucial to protecting the demography of the Muslim-majority state and its way of life.

The ruling Bharatiya Janata party repeatedly promised to scrap such rules, a long-term demand of its Hindu nationalist support base. But analysts warned doing so would almost certainly ignite unrest.

On Wednesday 31 October 2019, the government formally revoked Kashmir’s special status. The government argued that the provision had  only ever intended to be temporary and that scrapping it would boost investment in Kashmir. Critics, however, said the move would escalate tensions with Pakistan – which quickly called India’s actions illegal – and fuel resentment in Kashmir, where there is an insurgency against Indian rule.

What do the militants want?

There has been an armed insurgency against Indian rule over its section of Kashmir for the past three decades. Indian soldiers and Pakistan-backed guerrillas fought a war rife with accusations of torture, forced disappearances and extra-judicial killing.

Until 2004, the militancy was made up largely of Pakistani and Afghan fighters. Since then, especially after protests were quashed with extreme force in 2016, locals have made up a growing share of the anti-India fighters.

For Indians, control of Kashmir – part of the country’s only Muslim-majority state – has been proof of its commitment to religious pluralism. For Pakistan, a state founded as a homeland for south Asian Muslims, it is the last occupied home of its co-religionists.

Michael Safi and Rebecca Ratcliffe

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“It will begin to matter if there is violence in Kashmir and Delhi sees some of it as coming from Pakistan and then you’re back in the Pulwama sort of situation [where dozens of Indian paramilitaries were killed in a suicide car bombing]. Does India respond? If India responds, will there be escalation?”

Indian-administered Kashmir remains gripped by an unprecedented communications blackout that has cut off phone lines, internet and mobile coverage. Cable TV, initially suspended, is now running again but not showing any news programmes. The only source of news is satellite TV, which fewer people have access to.

A protester is reported to have died after being chased by police, and more than 100 people were arrested during a curfew in Srinagar, according to Agence France-Presse.

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Where in the world have governments imposed internet and telephone blackouts?

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Governments around the world have used internet blackouts, or blocked popular platforms such as WhatsApp, at times of political crisis. Several countries have also used temporary outages to try to foil cheats in national exams.

Netblocks monitors outages worldwide, and has recorded dozens of cases this year alone. But it is rare for all communication, including phone lines, to be severed. Countries that have limited their citizens’ communications, both temporarily and long-term, in recent years include:

  • India partially restored internet access in Kashmir in January 2020 after an unprecedented five-month blackout, but only for institutions providing “essential services”, while social media sites were still be banned. In March restrictions were lifted further. All mobile and broadband internet connections had been suspended when the government revoked the decades-long special status of Jammu and Kashmir, which had given the region autonomy.
  • Belarus president Alexander Lukashenko shut off internet access in August 2020 in the hope of stifling dissent following the disputed presidential election.
  • North Korea is probably the most isolated country in the world. Its people cannot make or receive international phone calls, or access the global internet. Mobile phones operate on a closed domestic network, and North Koreans can only surf a highly restricted national intranet.
  • Xinjiang region in western China was largely isolated for 10 months in 2010. After riots, Beijing blocked internet access and barred international phone calls. Since then an unprecedented surveillance system has been put in place that allows authorities to monitor residents’ phone and internet use rather than blocking it entirely.
  • China has blocked its internet off from the rest of the world wide web with digital barriers known colloquially as the ‘Great Firewall’. Companies that are a staple of digital life elsewhere, including Facebook, Google and Amazon, are blocked and unknown in China. However the controls can be dodged with a VPN, and phone connections to the rest of the world are open.
  • Sudan had a month-long internet blackout during mass demonstrations this year. Other countries have shut down the internet or blocked major sites during times of political tension, including Zimbabwe during fuel price protests this year and Uganda for the swearing in of a president whose re-election sparked protests.
  • Iraq, Algeria and Ethiopia are among several countries that have temporarily blocked the internet to prevent cheating in national high school exams. These blocks have usually only lasted a few hours.

Emma Graham-Harrison

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People arriving at Delhi’s airport from Kashmir on Wednesday morning described a state of lockdown that has left those with medical emergencies unable to call for ambulances, families unable to contact one another and the streets lined with heavy security.

“Every inch and corner is covered,” said Soayib Qureshi, a Delhi-based lawyer. “You cannot even go out of your house.”

In his neighbourhood, in downtown Srinagar, Kashmir’s biggest city, small protests – of 40-50 people – were taking place at night, when the curfew was relaxed after 10pm. He believed he heard teargas canisters being used elsewhere on Monday and Tuesday, but said the suspension of all communication meant people had little idea what was happening.

The announcement, he added, was a shock to everyone: “It’s a surgical strike.”

At night some movement is allowed, though there are checkpoints everywhere.

Ubaid Punjoo, who arrived in Delhi on Tuesday evening, said: “There is absolute anger [among] the people in the main politics, in the separatists. They have shut down the mainstream leaders, those leaders who have been with India for the past 70 years.”

Indian-administered Kashmir has held special status since 1954, giving it a degree of autonomy including its own constitution and as well as rules that prevented people from outside the state buying land in the territory. Many Kashmiris believe this is crucial to protecting the demography and traditions of India’s only Muslim-majority state.

The Indian government was condemned by the International Commission of Jurists (ICJ), which accused it of violating rights guaranteed under the Indian constitution and international law.

Sam Zarifi, the ICJ secretary general, said the announcement had been accompanied by “draconian new restrictions on freedom of expression, assembly and travel, and with an influx of thousands of unaccountable security personnel”.

In Pakistan’s parliament on Tuesday,the prime minister, Imran Khan, said he would raise the issue with the UN, adding: “I am afraid that [India] will now carry out ethnic cleansing in Kashmir.

“They will try to remove the local people and bring in others and make them a majority, so that the locals become nothing but slaves.”

This article was amended on 8 August 2019. An earlier version referred to India’s “ambassador” to Pakistan. This has been changed to “high commissioner”, the correct term for the top diplomat in Commonwealth countries.

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