IN the last week of November 2025, a group of United Nations experts published a landmark report detailing grave human rights violations in Indian Illegally Occupied Jammu and Kashmir (IIOJK).
The report, endorsed by eight UN Special Rapporteurs and Working Groups, documents widespread repression by Indian security forces since May 10, 2025, and urges both India and Pakistan to pursue a peaceful and durable settlement of the Kashmir dispute; one that genuinely reflects the aspirations of the Kashmiri people. The experts have also warned that the unresolved conflict between the two nuclear-armed neighbours continues to destabilize South Asia, posing risks that could spiral far beyond the region.
The UN has long acknowledged the suffering of the Kashmiri people since 1947 and, more brutally, after 1990, where India has maintained a regime of militarized control in the occupied territory, systematically suppressing Kashmiri demands for the UN-mandated right to self-determination. Over the decades, human rights organizations have repeatedly highlighted patterns of extrajudicial killings, enforced disappearances, torture, and arbitrary detentions. The UN Human Rights Council’s reports in June 2018 and July 2019 were particularly significant, documenting extensive violations and calling for an independent international inquiry. Pakistan welcomed those findings while India rejected them outright, refusing even the possibility of a neutral investigation.
While those earlier reports covered a broader historical period, the latest UN findings focus on developments following the Pahalgam attack, an incident widely regarded by neutral analysts as either a major security lapse or a deliberate false-flag operation engineered by India. According to many independent experts, India used the Pahalgam incident to achieve three objectives: (a) defame Pakistan by linking it to terrorism in IIOJK, (b) rally international opinion in favour of punitive measures against Pakistan and (c) intensify demographic engineering and enhance military control over IIOJK, a process accelerated since August 2019. In the aftermath of the Pahalgam attack, India escalated repression in IIOJK. Thousands of Kashmiris were arrested, beaten, or humiliated. Over 150 civilians were reportedly killed, ostensibly to avenge the attack. Indian officials and security personnel pressured community leaders, journalists, traders, students, and civil society representatives to publicly endorse India’s narrative blaming Pakistan. However, Kashmiris overwhelmingly rejected this version of events, asserting that Pakistan had no role in the incident and describing the attack either as a staged drama or a failure of Indian security agencies.
Indian media outlets, acting in tandem with official directives, attempted to coerce public statements from Kashmiris. Yet Kashmiris refused to participate in this propaganda campaign, leading to intensified harassment and intimidation. According to the UN experts, India had no moral, legal, or constitutional justification to punish the civilian population for refusing to adopt an officially crafted narrative. The report lists a series of harsh strategies adopted by Indian authorities following the Pahalgam incident. These include: (i) mass arrests of Kashmiris from the Valley, including journalists, rights activists, and community elders, (ii) torture of detainees in interrogation centres, private homes, and public spaces, (iii) the detention of young Kashmiris who questioned demographic changes or refused to implicate Pakistan in the attack, (iv) sexual violence against women used systematically as a weapon of war and (v) blanket impunity granted to Indian forces under draconian laws such as the Public Safety Act (PSA) and the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA), which permit prolonged detention without charge and contain vague, overly broad definitions of terrorism.
According to the UN findings, Indian security forces conducted sweeping military operations across IIOJK, detaining thousands of civilians. Many detainees were reportedly held incommunicado, denied access to legal counsel, and prevented from meeting family members. The experts expressed strong concern over “arbitrary arrests and detentions, suspicious deaths in custody, torture and ill-treatment, lynchings and discriminatory targeting of Kashmiri Muslims.” These practices, they said, were incompatible with India’s obligations under international law.
The report also highlights punitive home demolitions, forced evictions, and the arbitrary displacement of entire families—acts that amount to collective punishment. The demolition of civilian homes has become a central tool of Indian control in IIOJK. Families, including children and the elderly, were left exposed in open areas without shelter. Indian human rights violations in Kashmir have crossed all conceivable limits. Yet, due to strict communication blackouts and media censorship, the world rarely sees images, videos, or eyewitness accounts of the ongoing repression, unlike the globally documented genocide in Gaza.
The latest UN report, therefore, represents a rare and crucial window into the suffering of millions of Kashmiris. It underscores the urgency of international action at a time when India is rapidly altering the demography of the occupied State through the settlement of non-local populations, land confiscations, and new domicile laws. Given these serious findings, Pakistan must act swiftly and decisively. The UN experts’ report provides a strong legal and moral basis for Islamabad to present a comprehensive case at the United Nations, the International Court of Justice, and major global human rights bodies. Silence or delay will only embolden India to intensify its repressive tactics and demographic engineering.
The struggle of the Kashmiri people for dignity, justice, and self-determination must not be allowed to fade into obscurity. The UN experts have spoken; the world must listen. Most importantly, Pakistan must ensure that these findings translate into meaningful diplomatic and legal action to protect the oppressed people of IIOJK before irreversible changes take hold.
— The writer is Professor of Politics and IR at International Islamic University, Islamabad.
