Parveena Ahangar | |
---|---|
Born | |
Other names | Iron Lady of Kashmir |
Occupation(s) | Chairperson, Association of Parents of Disappeared Persons (APDP) |
Known for | |
Website | http://www.apdpkashmir.com |
Parveena Ahangar (born in Srinagar, Jammu and Kashmir) is the Founder and Chairperson of Association of Parents of Disappeared Persons (APDP) in Jammu and Kashmir.
Parveena Ahangar, was nominated for Nobel Peace Prize 2005 . She won the Rafto Prize for Human Rights in 2017 for her “protests against enforced disappearances” and for demanding justice for victims of violence in Jammu and Kashmir. [1] [2] She was named as one of the BBC 100 Women, a list of 100 inspiring and influential women from around the world for 2019. [3]
Parveena is referred to as the 'Iron lady of Kashmir'. [3] She was nominated by the Indian media Channel CNN IBN for an award which she rejected on account of the deceitful approach by Indian media over the pain and tragedies of Kashmiris. [4]
Parveena started the "Association of Parents of Disappeared Persons" in 1994 to provide support and mobilize family members of missing persons due to enforced disappearances and to put pressure on India's government to investigate the estimated 8-10,000 cases of involuntary disappearances in Kashmir. [5] The organization is part of the Asian Federation Against Involuntary Disappearances. [6]
Parveena Ahanger, co-founder and chairman of the Association of Parents of Disappeared Persons, has represented APDP’s cause in the Philippines (2000), Thailand (2003), Indonesia (2005), Chiang Mai (2006), Geneva (2008), Cambodia (2009) and London (2014). [7]
Ahanger spoke at London's University of Westminster in 2014. [8]
An enforced disappearance is the secret abduction or imprisonment of a person with the support or acquiescence of a state followed by a refusal to acknowledge the person's fate or whereabouts with the intent of placing the victim outside the protection of the law. Often, forced disappearance implies murder whereby a victim is abducted, may be illegally detained, and is often tortured during interrogation, ultimately killed, and the body disposed of secretly. The party committing the murder has plausible deniability as there is no evidence of the victim's death.
The Rafto Foundation for Human Rights was established in 1986 in memory of Thorolf Rafto, a professor of economic history at the Norwegian School of Economics (NHH) and a human rights activist. The main objective of the Rafto Foundation is the promotion of freedom of political expression and enterprise. The work of the foundation consists of different educational and informative projects, including the annual award of the Rafto Prize (Raftoprisen) each November. The foundation is based in Bergen, Norway and run by a small team of professionals and volunteers.
The insurgency in Jammu and Kashmir, also known as the Kashmir insurgency, is an ongoing separatist militant insurgency against the Indian administration in Jammu and Kashmir, a territory constituting the southwestern portion of the larger geographical region of Kashmir, which has been the subject of a territorial dispute between India and Pakistan since 1947.
The Human Rights Tulip is an annual prize awarded by the Dutch ministry of Foreign Affairs to a human rights defender or organisation who promotes and supports human rights in innovative ways. The Human Rights Tulip was established in 2007 and presented for the first time on 10 December 2008 and designed by the artist duo Adelheid and Huub Kortekaas.
Parvez Imroz is a Kashmiri human rights lawyer and a civil rights activist in Srinagar, the summer capital of the Jammu and Kashmir, India.
The Shopian rape and murder case, also known as Asiya, Neelofar case, is the abduction, rape and murder case of two young women allegedly by the CRPF. In mysterious circumstances between 29 and 30 May 2009 at Bongam, Shopian district in the Indian state of Jammu and Kashmir. Two women, who were sisters-in-law went missing from their orchard on the way home on 29 May 2009. The next morning, their bodies were found both one kilometer apart. Local police rejected the allegations saying that the women appeared to have drowned in a stream.On June 22 of 2023, the Jammu and Kashmir administration terminated two doctors, Dr. Bilal Ahmad Dalal and Dr. Nighat Shaheen Chilloo, for allegedly "actively working" with Pakistan-based groups and falsifying evidence in the case. According to officials, the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) found that the deaths of Asiya Jan and Neelofar on May 29, 2009, were due to accidental drowning, not rape or murder. The doctors allegedly manipulated the post-mortem report to frame security forces, aiming to incite disaffection against the Indian state. The CBI has charge-sheeted them for fabricating evidence, accusing them of conspiring with Pakistan-linked assets in Kashmir to distort the truth of the incident.
Nyla Ali Khan is an adjunct professor at Oklahoma City Community College. She is a former Visiting Professor at the University of Oklahoma, Norman, and former Associate Professor at the University of Nebraska-Kearney. She is the author of four books, and several articles that focus on the political issues and strife of her homeland, Jammu and Kashmir, India. She is the granddaughter of Sheikh Abdullah.
Human rights abuses in Jammu and Kashmir range from mass killings, enforced disappearances, torture, rape and sexual abuse to political repression and suppression of freedom of speech. The Indian Army, Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF), and Border Security Personnel (BSF) have been accused of committing severe human rights abuses against Kashmiri civilians. According to Seema Kazi, militant groups have also been held responsible for similar crimes, but the vast majority of abuses have been perpetrated by the armed forces of the Indian government.
Human rights abuses in Azad Kashmir, Pakistan, have been issue, ranging from forced disappearances, claimed torture to political repression and electoral fraud and suppression of freedom of speech. According to the human rights commission of Pakistan, Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) carries out extensive surveillance operations on the press and pro-independence groups, they have carried out arbitrary arrests in which people have been tortured and several have died. Asian Legal Resource Centre (ALRC) is cited to indicate that dozens have disappeared after their arrests in Pakistan-held Kashmir. A significant number of cases point to the Inter-Services Intelligence’s involvement in these disappearances".
Human rights abuses in the province ofBalochistan refers to the human rights violations that are occurring in the ongoing insurgency in Balochistan. The situation has drawn concern from the international community. The human rights situation in Balochistan is credited to the long-running conflict between Baloch nationalists and Pakistani security forces.
Human rights abuses in Kashmir have been perpetrated by various belligerents in the territories controlled by both India and Pakistan since the two countries' conflict over the region began with their first war in 1947–1948, shortly after the partition of British India. The organized breaches of fundamental human rights in Kashmir are tied to the contested territorial status of the region, over which India and Pakistan have fought multiple wars. More specifically, the issue pertains to abuses committed in Indian-administered Kashmir and in Pakistani-administered Kashmir.
The Asian Federation Against Involuntary Disappearances (AFAD) is an international human rights organization which focuses on the issue of forced disappearance in Asia. AFAD was founded on 4 June 1998 in Manila, Philippines. The federation was awarded the Asia Democracy and Human Rights Award in 2016.
International People's Tribunal on Human Rights and Justice in Kashmir (IPTK) is a People's Tribunal formed by Indian human rights activists for the purpose of probing human right violations in the Indian-administered territory of Jammu and Kashmir, and bridging the gap between people living in Kashmir and rest of India. It was first convened in 2008 by Parvez Imroz, Angana P. Chatterji, Gautam Navlakha and Zaheer-Ud-Din. Chatterji served as convener until December 2012.
Gautam Navlakha is an Indian human rights activist, journalist, and prisoner. He has written on left-wing extremism and is a critic of army and state atrocities in Kashmir. He is a member of People's Union for Democratic Rights, Delhi. He is also an editorial consultant of the Economic and Political Weekly. He resides in New Delhi.
Khurram Parvez is a Kashmiri human rights activist. He is the chairperson of Asian Federation Against Involuntary Disappearances (AFAD) and the program coordinator of Jammu Kashmir Coalition of Civil Society. Khurram is a recipient of the 2006 Reebok Human Rights Award. Parvez was included in Time's annual list of the 100 most influential people in 2022.
Forced disappearance in Pakistan originated during the military rule of General Pervez Musharraf. The practice continued during subsequent governments. The term missing persons is sometimes used as a euphemism. According to Amina Masood Janjua, a human rights activist and chairperson of Defence of Human Rights Pakistan, there are more than 5,000 reported cases of forced disappearance in Pakistan. Human rights activists allege that the law enforcement agencies in Pakistan are responsible for the cases of forced disappearance in Pakistan. However, the law enforcement agencies in Pakistan deny this and insist that many of the missing persons have either joined militant organisations such as the TTP in Afghanistan and other conflict zones or they have fled to be an illegal immigrant in Europe and died en route.
Mass graves of Jammu and Kashmir are mass grave sites in Jammu and Kashmir that were created as a result of extra-judicial killings during the Insurgency in Kashmir. An ad-hoc inquiry led by human rights lawyer, Parvez Imroz, has found more than 6,000 unmarked and mass graves.
AasiaJeelani (1974–2004) was a Kashmiri journalist and human rights activist. After completing her studies in Srinagar, Kashmir, she worked for Agence France Presse (AFP) and then the Times of India. She set up the Association of Parents of Disappeared Persons (APDP) and the Kashmiri Women's Initiative for Peace and Disarmament (KWIPD), editing the latter's newsletter. On 20 April 2004, Jeelani and other activists were monitoring elections when the car she was travelling in was blown up by an improvised explosive device and she was killed. She is remembered as a pioneering feminist journalist.