Human Rights: Kashmir

Paul Bristow Excerpts

Thursday 23rd September 2021 Commons Chamber

[Paul Bristow (Peterborough) (Con)]

I also thank the Backbench Business Committee for allowing this important debate.

The hon. Member for Oldham East and Saddleworth (Debbie Abrahams) rightly said that awareness of this issue is not widespread in this country, but lots of people and Kashmiri human rights organisations in my city and in communities across the country are working hard to spread awareness. This debate is, in part, down to them and their hard work. I thank Friends of Kashmir in Peterborough, Abdul Choudhuri, Mohammad Choudhary, Ghafarat Shahid, Mohammad Ikram and Mohammad Yousaf for all their work in highlighting this issue.

What happens in Kashmir matters in Peterborough, not just because we have a 20,000 Kashmiri diaspora population in my city but because if we care about human rights, we care about Kashmir. I suggest that all hon. Members care about human rights and, if they do, they should reflect on the murder, torture, rape and all the other atrocities happening in Indian-occupied Kashmir. My hon. Friends the Members for Dewsbury (Mark Eastwood), for Hyndburn (Sara Britcliffe) and for Stoke-on-Trent North (Jonathan Gullis), who cannot be here today, care deeply about these issues, too.

In another world, I am chair of the all-party parliamentary group on British Muslims, and it is incumbent on British Muslims to be aware that this Government and all hon. Members in the Chamber today care about atrocities and human rights abuses carried out against their fellow Muslims across the world. I ask the Minister to think about it carefully. Just as we care about injustice against the Rohingya and the Uyghur, we also care about injustice against the Kashmiris.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

The hon. Gentleman mentions persecution against many peoples, and there is anti-Christian violence in Kashmir, too. Christians have their churches burned and there is forced conversion of Christians by brutal force, physical and sexual violence, rape and murder. Christians need equality in Kashmir, too.

[Paul Bristow]

The hon. Gentleman must have read my mind, because I was going to come on to that next. Just as we care about atrocities against the Rohingya and the Uyghur and about persecuted Christians around the world, we must make sure that we stand up for persecuted Muslim communities, too.

I completely reject the argument that, somehow, to care about human rights in Kashmir is anti-Indian. India is the seventh largest country in the world by land area and it has the second largest population, at 1.2 billion. India’s list of economic and other achievements is impressive, but the ongoing human rights situation in Kashmir does not benefit India at all. If India wants to take its place as one of the great world powers, surely the human rights abuses in Kashmir hold it back and make people feel differently about India.

I stand with the hundreds of millions of Indians across the world and with the Indian diaspora in this country who care about human rights. This is not just a Muslim issue. Ordinary people in this country care about human rights, and that includes our Indian diaspora population.

This is a bilateral issue for India and Pakistan, and we face our own territorial arguments on the Falkland Islands and Gibraltar. We will never negotiate the sovereignty of Gibraltar or the Falkland Islands without consulting the Gibraltarians or the Falkland islanders themselves. We say that self-determination for these people is important, and if it is good enough for the people of the Falkland Islands and Gibraltar, it is good enough for the people of Kashmir.