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MIRPUR, Jan 13 (APP):Azad Jammu Kashmir President Barrister Sultan Mahmood Chaudhry has said that being a mutual friend of India and Pakistan, Norway should play its role as a mediator to help the two countries resolve the lingering Kashmir issue peacefully, it was officially said.
The AJK President expressed these views while talking to former Norwegian Prime Minister Kjell Magne Bondevik, who called on him at the Presidency in Jammu Kashmir House in the federal metropolis on Monday, APP AJK Correspondent reports, quoting the president’s office on Monday.
Norwegian Ambassador to Pakistan Per Albert Ilsaas, former member of the Norwegian Parliament of Pakistani origin, Amir Javed Sheikh and others were also present in the meeting, the president’s office said.
Speaking on the occasion, Barrister Chaudhry, while stressing the need for third-party mediation to resolve the Kashmir conflict, said that Norway, which had played a key role in the peace process in the Middle East, can also contribute significantly to bringing India and Pakistan to the negotiating table and bringing about a just and honorable solution to the issue of Kashmir.
He said that peace and stability in South Asia were inescapably linked to the settlement of the Kashmir issue.
Referring to Norway’s excellent human rights record, Barrister Chaudhry said that Norway should also play its due role to help stop ongoing human rights violations in occupied Kashmir. Citing Kashmiris’ decades’-long struggle for the right to self-determination, the president of Azad Kashmir said that there was a dire need for influential world governments, including Norway, to play their much-needed role to help Kashmiri people to attain their inalienable right, the right to self-determination guaranteed to them by no less an authority than the United Nations.
Briefing the delegation about the worsening political and human rights situation in the Indian-occupied territory of Jammu and Kashmir, Barrister Sultan Mahmood Chaudhry expressed that the rights situation in the region had exacerbated since the RSS-influenced regime led by Narendra Modi abrogated Article 370.
On this occasion, former Norwegian Prime Minister Kajal Magne Bondevik invited the President of Azad Jammu and Kashmir, Barrister Sultan Mahmood Chaudhry, to visit Norway, which he accepted.