Kashmir

Shabana Mahmood Excerpts

Thursday 11th September 2014 Westminster Hall

[Shabana Mahmood (Birmingham, Ladywood) (Lab)]

I am very grateful to be able to make a contribution to the debate, Mr Hollobone. I congratulate the hon. Member for Bradford East (Mr Ward) on securing it.

I shall begin by reflecting on some of the contributions that we have already heard. In particular, there was the sense that somehow it might be seen as offensive elsewhere that we should be debating this issue in the British Parliament. The explanation given by other hon. Members was that we have a duty to stand up for the rights of our constituents. I hope that, in conjunction with its being our duty to stand up for the views, hopes and dreams of our constituents, it is also because we have a tradition of speaking about matters of concern in other countries. That is the whole point, as I understand it, of having a foreign policy.

We often debate in the House issues of concern in other countries. We did so yesterday on the Floor of the House in relation to events in the middle east. We have had debates on Israel, Palestine and the recent fighting in Gaza. I see nothing wrong and nothing to be ashamed of in the British Parliament’s having a debate today about the situation in Kashmir. On the Order Paper, the debate is entitled “Political and humanitarian situation in Kashmir”. There is a political situation in Kashmir because that is a territory under dispute, and there is a humanitarian situation in Kashmir as a result of natural disasters and the territorial dispute, so quite apart from the justification that we speak for tens of thousands of British Kashmiris, we are just doing our job.

Let me make it clear that I am speaking in the debate for those reasons—because tens of thousands of my constituents are British Kashmiris, Kashmiri in origin—but also because of my own background. Both my parents were born in a village called Bab-e-yaam in the district of Mirpur in Azad Jammu and Kashmir. All four of my grandparents were born in what was, before that time, the princely state of Jammu and Kashmir. This debate has personal resonance for me because it relates to my own family roots, my own history and my own identity.

The situation in Jammu and Kashmir is of grave concern, as I have said, to many thousands of our constituents across this country and to many people all over the world. What happened after partition—the blood-soaked birth of modern-day Pakistan and India—was that a group of people from different backgrounds, different religions and cultures, saw their homeland ultimately split between two countries. That is what has given rise to the current long-standing dispute.

Those of us privileged enough to know either Azad Jammu and Kashmir or Jammu and Kashmir itself can testify that it is a truly beautiful part of the world; it is often described as heaven on earth. It has been scarred for too long by this conflict. It often does not get much attention in our media, but it is very real and very alive for many people.

The world, through the United Nations, long ago resolved that the people of Jammu and Kashmir should be able to exercise their own will to determine their own future. The inexplicable failure to give effect to that desire for self-determination, to those UN resolutions, is, in my view, unjust and has undeniably caused great turmoil, pain and suffering, which we have heard powerful examples of from my hon. Friend the Member for Rochdale (Simon Danczuk). As the case that he highlighted, of Parveena Ahangar, shows, in Indian-administered Jammu and Kashmir that failure has resulted in an uprising, and India’s attempts to suppress that uprising have led to grave human rights violations. That is not my personal finding, but the finding of the respected organisation Amnesty International. It produced some time ago a report called “A ‘Lawless Law’”, which was the subject of our previous House of Commons debate about the Kashmir dispute.

It is undeniable that the Kashmir valley is heavily militarised and that the violence has taken the lives of tens of thousands of people. Whether you place those numbers at the lower end, at about 40,000, or at the higher end of the estimates, at about 100,000, they are, even at the lower end, mind-boggling. They defy comprehension and are a scar on the conscience of all humanity.

A common complaint that we hear from people in Jammu and Kashmir relates to the fact that the huge number of security forces operating in that area do so with impunity because of the feared and hated Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act, which prevents the prosecution of troops. I cannot imagine what it must be like to live in a place where there is one soldier for every 17 civilians, given that that number on its own would far outnumber any known or potential militants.

I can only conclude that such a large number of soldiers operating in that area will increase the pressure felt by the local civilian population. As we heard, there are many heartbreaking stories of disappearances, particularly of teenagers, and thousands of unmarked mass graves were discovered in the northern districts. Time will unfortunately prevent me from discussing those issues in detail, but they remain real human rights violations. I believe that those need to be answered if we are to have the open and honest debate that the issue deserves.

In addition to the human rights violations, there is a humanitarian crisis caused by the recent floods and the previous earthquake. Undeniably, the people of the region have suffered greatly on many fronts. If we are to give voice to the desire of people in the region to set their own destiny, we must accept that some wish to be wholly a part of India; some wish to be a part of Pakistan; some wish the line of control to be the effective border, but desire freedom of movement across it; and some wish to reunite Jammu and Kashmir into what it was before partition and make it completely independent.

Whatever one’s personal view, it is for the people of the region to decide the course of their own destiny. It is not for me, even as one whose identity and roots hail from that part of the world, to say what their fate should be. I am a Small Heathen Brummie, which makes me an Englishwoman and a Brit.

I have no right to tell the Kashmiri people what their future should be, but I will always speak up passionately for their right to decide their future for themselves. We are seeing that happen in our own country; a week from today, a people with their own land, culture and identity will make a choice about the future course of their own destiny, and it is only right for the people of Kashmir to be given the same choice. For many decades, they have lived in expectation of being given that choice. That was the promise post-partition, and it is not unreasonable for them to expect that promise to be kept. It is not unreasonable for the diaspora communities who live in Britain to want that right to be given to Kashmir.

We have had some discussion about the role of the British Government. I believe that their role should be that of a critical friend to both Pakistan and India. We have a moral responsibility to encourage both sides to move towards a resolution of the dispute, but we also have a responsibility to speak up for the Kashmiri people and to ensure that their voice is heard.

Gaza

Shabana Mahmood Excerpts

Monday 14th July 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hague]

My hon. Friend makes a telling point. The history of the past nine years would be different had Hamas or any other Palestinian leaders in Gaza been able to take it in a different direction. However, I have also reiterated today the many criticisms that have been made of Israeli policy. The rockets or their components have clearly been smuggled in, probably largely through such tunnels. Egypt has closed many of the tunnels, which is one thing that has put Hamas under more pressure in recent months, but Hamas has to see that it is pointless to continue with this cycle of violence.

[Shabana Mahmood (Birmingham, Ladywood) (Lab)]

We have had several contributions about the proportionality of Israel’s military response, but we are ultimately discussing innocent people and children dying. With that in mind, at what point does the Foreign Secretary think that we should move from a proportionate to a disproportionate response? Surely the current death toll in Gaza is the clearest sign of a disproportionate and indiscriminate response. Will he declare it as such?

[Mr Hague]

The tragedy is that there are innocent civilians on all sides. People are suffering terribly in Gaza, but the 5 million Israelis who live within rocket range and are running for their underground shelters every few hours are also innocent civilians. Our emphasis must therefore be on doing the things that I have described: promoting a ceasefire; providing humanitarian relief; and reviving the peace process. Those are three clear planks of our policy and I am sure that they are right.

Oral Answers to Questions

Shabana Mahmood Excerpts

Tuesday 5th March 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr William Bain (Glasgow North East) (Lab)]

11. What progress he has made in developing proposals to repatriate powers from the EU.

[Shabana Mahmood (Birmingham, Ladywood) (Lab)]

15. What progress he has made in developing proposals to repatriate powers from the EU.

[The Minister for Europe (Mr David Lidington)]

The Government have already made progress on securing reforms to the EU, by ending Britain’s obligation to bail out eurozone members, by ensuring that the smallest businesses are exempted from EU regulations, by securing protections on banking union and by achieving a shift in fisheries policy towards local and regional management.

[Mr Lidington]

It is this Government’s commitment to growth, jobs and prosperity in Europe that lay behind the achievement of the EU’s free trade agreements with the Republic of Korea and with Singapore, attained during the lifetime of this coalition Government, and it is the firm alliance between our Prime Minister and the German Chancellor that is driving forward, with the Commission, moves in Europe towards an historic transatlantic trade deal. I wish that the Opposition were sometimes a little less grudging.

[Shabana Mahmood]

Does the Minister agree that seeking to repatriate powers in the areas of employment and social affairs would not be about regaining powers from Europe, but rather about taking away the rights of working people here at home?

[Mr Lidington]

I sincerely hope that the hon. Lady is not seeking, by means of that question, to suggest that she supports an end to our opt-out from the 48-hour working week under the working time directive. I hope that she is not being complacent about the European Court of Justice judgments that have caused such difficulties for the national health service and for the social care sector, problems that are not unique to the United Kingdom and concerns about which are shared by many other member states.

Human Rights on the Indian Subcontinent

Shabana Mahmood Excerpts

Thursday 15th September 2011 Commons Chamber

[Shabana Mahmood (Birmingham, Ladywood) (Lab)]

I am grateful to be called to contribute to this important debate and I congratulate the hon. Members for Wycombe (Steve Baker) and for Ilford North (Mr Scott) on securing it. I am pleased that it has proved so popular with parliamentary colleagues, although the unfortunate flip-side is that we have a strict time limit on our contributions.

Like the hon. Member for Wycombe, I wish to focus my comments on the situation in Kashmir. This topic is important to me because my constituency, and Birmingham as a whole, has a large British-Kashmiri population, some of whose members are here for the debate and many of whom have written to me asking me to voice their concerns in the House. The subject is also important to me personally, because I am of Kashmiri origin: my family originated from the Mirpur district of Pakistani-administered Kashmir, both my parents were born there and I still have family and friends there. Consequently, the plight of Kashmiris and the necessity of finding a peaceful resolution to the Kashmir dispute have loomed large in my life.

For too long the beautiful region of Kashmir, often described as paradise on earth, has been caught in one of the world’s most dangerous conflicts, but it is a conflict that is little reported and often does not get the media and global political attention that it needs and deserves. I am grateful, therefore, that this debate has given us an opportunity to focus on the issue. I know, too, that many British Kashmiris are grateful to the all-party group on Kashmir and Sultan Mehmood Chaudhry, a former Prime Minister of Azad Kashmir, for their efforts to raise the profile of this dispute and to secure political debate and action.

The failure to resolve the Kashmir dispute, and particularly the failure to give effect to UN resolutions from the 1940s urging a plebiscite in Kashmir so that the Kashmiri people can determine their own future, has resulted in an uprising in Indian-administered Kashmir, the suppression of which, according to Amnesty International’s “lawless law” report, has led to grave human rights violations. The report highlights disturbing and unacceptable cases of abuse, with the application of the Jammu and Kashmir Public Safety Act 1978, in particular, undermining efforts to achieve a peaceful resolution. Amnesty International found that many cases in which the Public Safety Act had been applied involved lengthy periods of illegal detention of political activists seeking Kashmiri independence, in violation of Indian national law as well as international law. Many cases featured allegations of torture and other forms of ill treatment being used to coerce people into making confessions.

One of the most offensive features of the Public Safety Act is that it provides for immunity from prosecution for officials operating under it, thereby granting impunity for human rights violations under the law. The application of the Act, together with the discovery of mass graves in Kashmir, the Mumbai attacks in 2008 and Kashmir’s bloody summer of 2010, have undermined the prospects for a resolution of the dispute.

[Lyn Brown (West Ham) (Lab)]

My hon. Friend is making a passionate speech, and I am proud to be sitting here listening to her. Does she agree that India should accept the findings of the commission on the mass graves in Kashmir?

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[Shabana Mahmood]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for her intervention, and I endorse her contribution. I know that she, too, is a passionate advocate of human rights on the Indian subcontinent.

A resolution is needed, desperately and urgently. The world, and especially the people of Kashmir, cannot afford for India and Pakistan to be engaged in perpetual dispute over the region. The human cost is too great. The partition of the two countries in 1947 resulted in hundreds of thousands dead. In the three wars that have been fought between the two states more than 15,000 people have died, and the estimates of the number of dead following the uprisings in Kashmir range from 40,000 to 100,000. Both countries spend too much of their budgets on defence; that money should be channelled into eradicating poverty and promoting health, education and human rights. India and Pakistan have both acquired nuclear weapons, and the fear that the hostility between the two countries, which springs from a mix of religion, history and territory, might change quickly into armed conflict is very real and never too far away. Meanwhile the people of Kashmir continue to suffer, so a resolution of the dispute deserves and demands our attention, and talks must be pursued with vigour on all sides.

[John Hemming]

Does the hon. Lady agree that this debate shows that we are not forgetting Kashmir? The treatment of the people of Kashmir is key, and we will not ignore that.

[Shabana Mahmood]

I endorse the hon. Gentleman’s comments. As I have said, I am grateful that we are having this debate today.

I said that all sides needed to pursue a solution with vigour, because too often the rest of the world sees only India and Pakistan as the main contestants in the dispute. It is my contention, however, that the Kashmiri people themselves are the central party and should be treated as such, as it is their future that is at the heart of the dispute.

I also think that the British Government have a vital role to play, not only because of our history but because our country is home to large diaspora communities from India, Pakistan and Kashmir. We therefore have a unique insight into the intricacies of the dispute, and an important role to play in achieving its resolution. We should be a critical friend to both India and Pakistan, and a strong advocate of the rights of Kashmiris. They are a strong, resilient, proud, generous and passionate people, and their land is a place of great natural beauty and potential. Their plight demands our attention, and they deserve our efforts to bring the injustice that they have suffered to an end.

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[Fiona Mactaggart]

rose—

[Shabana Mahmood]

Will my hon. Friend give way?

[Barry Gardiner]

No, I will not.

Some of the worst human rights abuses of recent memory have occurred in Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Myanmar, in a part of the world where, frankly, India stands out as a beacon of democracy on the subcontinent. The relations between India and the UK, at both a trade and a strategic level, are excellent. They reached new levels of cordiality after Tony Blair’s visit in 2005, when the two Prime Ministers signed the New Delhi declaration, and they have been further strengthened by the current Prime Minister’s visit last year. Economically and culturally, as well as strategically, it would be a retrograde step should a debate such as this sour those excellent relations.

I first visited Kashmir in 2000, when I took a delegation of MPs on a fact-finding visit. We visited at a particularly important time: two years previously, both India and Pakistan had declared themselves nuclear weapon states. Pakistan had announced that it would adopt a doctrine of first use in certain circumstances. India had stated to the international community that it would never use nuclear weapons first. It was a time of great tension.

In 1999, Atal Bihari Vajpayee travelled to Pakistan to meet Nawaz Sharif. It had been hoped that that might reduce the tension between the two states and all seemed well. Three months later, however, Pakistan-based militants invaded across the border at Kargil on the line of control into India. A bloody border conflict started in what became known as the phoney war. That invasion directly violated the Simla agreement of 1972, in which both nations agreed to resolve the issue of Kashmir by exclusively peaceful means.

President Clinton summoned Nawaz Sharif to the White House and persuaded him to withdraw Pakistani forces from Kargil. The confrontation de-escalated until Nawaz Sharif was overthrown by General Musharraf, who had been the key architect of the Kargil incursion. In 2000, Musharraf proclaimed himself the new President of Pakistan, without the benefit of a general election. In the following months, India was subjected to some of the most vile and well-orchestrated state-sponsored terrorist attacks ever seen, including the hijacking of an Air India flight, the attack on the temple at Gandhinagar and, of course, the attack on the Indian Parliament.

Despite the constant threat to India’s citizens from hostile parties at home and abroad claiming thousands of lives every year, India has continued to stand for tolerance and human rights in that part of the world. Terrorist groups such as Lashkar-e-Taiba and Jaish-e-Mohammed have continued to bombard India with state-sponsored terrorism supported by Inter-Services Intelligence.

It is against that background that we must consider today’s Amnesty International report. The report documents detentions under the Jammu and Kashmir Public Safety Act and makes some specific allegations. It is right that this House should consider them, albeit in the context of public safety that I have outlined. The report relates to more than 600 individuals detained under the Public Safety Act between 2003 and May 2010 when the research was conducted. That is fewer than 90 people each year for seven years. Amnesty states:

“The research shows that instead of using the institutions, procedures and human rights safeguards of ordinary criminal justice, the authorities are using the PSA to secure the long-term detention of political activists, suspected members or supporters of armed groups and a range of other individuals against whom there is insufficient evidence for a trial or conviction”.

That sounds remarkably similar, as the hon. Member for Wycombe admitted, to this country’s Prevention of Terrorism Act 2005. On 14 July last year, he voted to keep detention at 28 days and I think I voted to bring it down to 14 days.

At this year’s Reith lectures, Eliza Manningham-Buller, the former head of MI5, talking about security, said that

“not all intelligence can be turned into evidence. It can fall well short. As I have said before, of evidential standards, hearsay at third hand, things said, things overheard, things seen and open to varying interpretation, rarely clear-cut even with the benefit of hindsight…and which any judge would unhesitatingly kick out even if the prosecution thought them useable. That requires us to accept that not everyone who presents a threat can be prosecuted.”

It is in that light that we need to consider these allegations.

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[Kelvin Hopkins]

I entirely agree with my hon. Friend and thank her for her intervention. Wherever suffering occurs, we must always support human rights; we have a record in doing so. More than one of my hon. Friends has mentioned that India is a great democracy. Indeed it is, but great democracies can also commit sins and have blood on their hands. In Britain, we consider ourselves to be a great democracy, but recent revelations about the Hola camp and what we did in Kenya, as well as about what we did to certain prisoners in Iraq suggest that even a democracy like ours can have blood on its hands. We must not excuse terrible things just because a country is a democracy.

[Shabana Mahmood]

Does my hon. Friend agree that no democracy—whether it be the world’s largest or not—should be afraid of a debate, either in the House, like today’s debate, or anywhere else, if that debate helps to shed some light on what is going on in another part of the world?

[Kelvin Hopkins]

I entirely agree with my hon. Friend.

I was about to make an important point about Robin Cook’s reference to an ethical foreign policy. It did not make him popular with America, but Robin Cook stood by his position and resigned over the Iraq war. That contrasts with what I believe Palmerston once said, and here I paraphrase—that in politics, there are no such things as rights and wrongs, only interests. We must raise ethics above interests sometimes in politics, as I am sure all Members do. In time, I hope that we will ensure that Pakistan and India come to a moral and ethical solution, allowing Kashmir and the Kashmiri people to determine their own future.