Pakistan gets success on Kashmir in UN: Qureshi

Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi has said Pakistan will continue to extend its moral, political and diplomatic support to the oppressed Kashmiri brethren in their just struggle for right to self-determination.

He was speaking at a meeting with parliamentary leaders of Azad Kashmir in Islamabad Saturday, which discussed future strategy for highlighting the six-month-long curfew and gross human rights violations in occupied Kashmir. The foreign minister said "we made extensive efforts to raise the dire human rights violations in occupied Kashmir at diplomatic level."

He said Kashmir issue is present at the agenda of the UN Security Council, but Pakistan's effort to move the Security Council again was aimed at highlighting the Kashmir issue afresh and get Pakistan's stance reiterated. "We got success at the Security Council and the Kashmir issue was discussed."

Shah Mahmood Qureshi said Pakistan also effectively raised Kashmir issue at the meeting of the Human Rights Council in Geneva. He said Kashmir issue has also been debated at EU Parliament and the US Congress. He said the Kashmir Cell established at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs on the direction of the Prime Minister is playing its effective role to highlight the Kashmir issue.