Pakistan-administered Kashmir
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Pakistan-administered Kashmir (PAK), which India refers to as Pakistan-Occupied Kashmir (POK), is a disputed territory claimed by both India and Pakistan, but controlled by Pakistan. It is administratively divided into three parts:
- The Islamic Republic of Azad Kashmir;
- The Northern Areas, consisting of the regions of Gilgit and Baltistan. Gilgit was an agency leased by the Maharaja to British Government. Baltistan was western district of Ladakh province which was annexed by Pakistan in 1948. Both regions of Gilgit and Baltistan are administered as a de facto "Federal Territory" of Pakistan by a Pakistani minister. As the area is part of the disputed Jammu and Kashmir region, the local population is denied the right to vote or send representatives to the Pakistani parliament or senate;
- A part of Hunza-Gilgit called Raskam and the Shaksgam Valley of Baltistan region, ceded by Pakistan to the People's Republic of China in 1963 pending settlement of the dispute over Kashmir. This ceded area is also known as the Trans-Karakoram Tract.
These territories border the Indian state of Jammu and Kashmir to the east and Pakistan to the west.
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[edit] History
After the partition of the former British colony of India into the Republic of India and the Islamic Republic of Pakistan, the Maharaja of Kashmir had the option of joining either India or Pakistan. He chose to join neither. Seeing this opportunity to occupy a sovereign state, Pakistan sent Kabali Pashtun tribesman to attack the state. The tribesman went on a rampage, raping women and killing innocent people. Maharaja with small army force could not defend his territory and asked India for help and signed the accession treaty. Kashmir Accession Document. India pushed by the tribesman and went to United Nations for appeal. UN asked for a ceasefire and the current Line of Control came into existence. After hostilities ceased in 1949, the area of Kashmir under Pakistani control came to be known as "Pakistan Occupied Kashmir", while Pakistan referred to the area of Kashmir retained by India as "Indian Administrated Kashmir" (Maqbuzah Kashmir).
[edit] Human Rights
A recent Human Rights Watch report enumerates the rather unimpressive state of human rights in PoK. [1] Though the Minister of State for Information and Broadcasting, Pakistan, Tariq Azeem opined that the report was "biased and inaccurate" and contained "factual errors", the report says that political rights and civil liberties of the people are restricted as the area is dominated by Pakistan military and intelligence agencies who use arbitrary detentions and tortures to maintain their hold over the region.
The report says: "Azad Kashmir is a land of strict curbs on political pluralism, freedom of expression, and freedom of association; a muzzled press; banned books; arbitrary arrest and detention and torture at the hands of the Pakistani military and police; and discrimination against refugees from Jammu and Kashmir state."
It says Kashmiri nationalists are singled out for discrimination because they do not support the idea of Kashmir's accession to Pakistan and that the tight controls on freedom of expression do not, however, apply to Pakistani-backed militant groups.
[edit] See also
- Kashmiriyat - a socio-cultural ethos of religious harmony and Kashmiri consciousness.
- Instrument of Accession (Jammu and Kashmir) to the Country / Dominion of India
- Kashmir conflict
- Indian Kashmir barrier
- Timeline of the Kashmir conflict
- Indo-Pakistani Wars
- Azad Kashmir an area of Kashmir adminstered by Pakistan
- Line of Control Kashmir
- Kargil War or the Indo-Pakistani War of 1999
- LOC Kargil, a 2003 Bollywood war film based on "Kargil War" or the "Indo-Pakistani War of 1999", directed by J.P.Dutta
- Indo-China War Kashmir
- Trans-Karakoram Tract an area of Kashmir administered by China, in fact an integral part of Jammu and Kashmir
- Aksai Chin an area of Kashmir adminstered by China, in fact an integral part of Jammu and Kashmir
- Balawaristan
- Balti language
- Balti people
- Terrorism in Kashmir
- List of Kashmiris
- Shaikh Abdullah, Politician
- List of topics on the land and the people of “Jammu and Kashmir”
[edit] External links
- Kashmir
- BBC article
- The Hindu article on human rights in PoK
- Proclamation of May 1, 1951 on Jammu & Kashmir Constituent Assembly by Yuvraj (Crown Prince) Karan Singh from the Official website of Government of Jammu and Kashmir, India
- Conflict in Kashmir: Selected Internet Resources by the Library, University of California, Berkeley, USA; University of California at Berkeley Library Bibliographies and Web-Bibliographies list
