When the other US president came visiting... For Himal Southasian, my piece around the Chattisinghpora and Brakpora massacres, the Pathribal fake encounter, the Indian judiciary... Indias impunity in Kashmir. /// On the twentieth morning of March, 2000, millions of people across India were glued to their television sets, elated at yet another indication of the country’s arrival on the world stage. The president of the United States had just arrived for a grand, official visit, the first by a US president in 22 years. Later in the day, as darkness descended on the faraway Himalayan valley of Kashmir, approximately 20 armed men entered the sleepy, largely unknown village of Chattisinghpora. Dressed in army uniforms, they asked the men of the village, all Sikhs, to line up outside the village gurudwara while the women stayed indoors. It was supposed to be a usual cordon-and-search operation by the army. Minutes later, the gunmen would disappear into the darkness of night, leaving 36 of the community’s men butchered to death. According to Farooq Khan, the district SSP, “Preliminary inquiries revealed that most of the militants were foreign mercenaries.” As the world woke up to the gruesome news the next morning, President Clinton expressed his ‘outrage’, and “shared [the country’s] heartbreak over last night’s brutal attack in Kashmir”. The massacre reminded him, he said, of “what tremendous suffering” India had undergone. “The violence must end. This is the time for restraint.” ///
Posted on: Sun, 25 Jan 2015 17:25:04 +0000
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