United States on Tuesday urged Indian authorities to respect human right and restore full access to services, including internet and mobile networks in Occupied Kashmir.
Alice G Wells, Acting Assistant Secretary of State for South and Central Asia, said this in a statement submitted to the subcommittee on Asia, the Pacific, and Nonproliferation of the US House Foreign Affairs Committee.
She further told the committee that “The US State Department remains concerned about the situation in the Indian occupied Kashmir Valley, where daily life for the nearly eight million residents has been severely impacted since August 5,”
Wells told the Congressional subcommittee a day before the hearing on topic “Human Rights in South Asia: Views from the State Department and the Region” that “… the Valley has not returned to normal,”
Wells further said that the State Department has raised concerns with the Indian government regarding detentions of residents and political leaders, including three former chief ministers of Jammu and Kashmir.
She further exclaimed that “While exact figures are difficult to ascertain, we understand several thousand people have been detained many without charges – under the Public Safety Act- over the past two months”