The 18th meeting of Group of Twenty (G20), a summit scheduled to take place in International Exhibition-Convention Centre (IECC), Pragati Maidan, New Delhi, after India received the presidency for G20 2023 last year. It will be the first ever G20 summit to be held in India as well as in South Asia.
After receiving the presidency of the G 20 summit from Indonesia last year, Modi tried to up the political pressure on opposition parties and Pakistan. G 20 is an intergovernmental bloc of 19 countries and the European Union. The group accounts for 80 percent of the world’s gross domestic product (GDP).
Indian Illegally occupied Jammu and Kashmir (IIOJK) is the disputed territory between Indian and Pakistan with a United Nations security council resolution calling for free and fair plebiscite under UN supervision.
India and Pakistan have fought three wars on Kashmir since 1947 with continued escalation on the border between two countries. The latest major escalation happened in 2019 when Indian fighter pilots tried to enter Pakistan airspace and were hit by Pakistani pilots capturing one pilot and drowning two fighter jets.
The third G20 working group meeting on tourism will be held in the disputed region from May 22 to 24 – the first global event there since August 5, 2019, when India scrapped the semi-autonomous nature of Indian occupied Kashmir, by abolishing article 370 and 35A of the Indian constitution and divided Indian occupied Kashmir into two union territories with direct control from Delhi. The last local elections in IIOJK happened in 2013.
India is trying to show the fake normalcy in IIOJK to world by holding tourism meeting of G 20 nations in disputed territory. If there is normalcy in IIOJK than India would have not deployed over one million forces to control the population of over 140 Muslims making it world’s largest militarized zone.
Fernand de Varennes, the United Nations special rapporteur on minority issues, also accused India of seeking to normalise the “brutal and repressive denial of democratic and other rights of Kashmiri Muslims and minorities” by holding G20 meetings in the disputed region.
He further said the situation in Kashmir “should be decried and condemned and not pushed under the rug and ignored”.
“The government of India is seeking to normalise what some have described as a military occupation by instrumentalsing a G20 meeting and portray an international ‘seal of approval’.”
China and Turkey have said that they will not attend the G 20 tourism meeting in Srinagar IIOJK which is a big blow to India. Saudi Arabia and few other countries are expected to follow the suit to avoid visiting the disputed region.
This diplomatic win for Pakistan who has worked tirelessly to highlight the human rights violations by Indian forces in IIOJK now has support of China and Turkey who are members of G 20 and are not attending its summit in IIOJK.
Pakistan’s Foreign Minister Bilawal Bhutto Zardari is visiting Muzaffarabad to send a clear message to India and the world that Pakistan will continue its diplomatic and moral support to Kashmir.