JKLF to field 37 candidates in PoK Assemby election

Jammu, May 27 (UNI)Jammu Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF) has announced to field candidates for 37 out of 41 constituencies of Pakistan-occupied Kashmir Legislative Assembly for the election to be held on July 11.

Talking to UNI over phone from PoK, the JKLF Chief Amanullah Khan said he has decided to fight assembly election in Pakistan-Occupied Kashmir.

Mr Khan also informed that this decision was formally declared by Sardar M. Saghir Advocate, the Secretary General of and the chief of the Parliamentary Board of JKLF.

The JKLF Secretary General of Amanullah Khan Faction said the election rules for PoK Assembly provide that each candidate would have to state under oath that he/ she supports the accession of entire Jammu Kashmir State to Pakistan.

The JKLF and other pro-independence Kashmiri organizations term this provision of the election rules as most undemocratic and contrary to basic human rights, he said and added that JKLF had decided that its candidates would take the oath of working for complete independence of the whole State instead of declaring that they support State's accession to Pakistan.

Sardar M. Saghir said that JKLF had fielded 32 candidates in 2001 elections who had pledged to work for independence of the whole State instead of undertaking to work for State's accession to Pakistan.

Almost all these nominations were rejected which caused protest rallies by JKLF activists throughout Pakistan-occupied Kashmir resulting in arrest of over 350 of them including many candidates and chairman Mr Amanullah Khan. These activists were released long after the elections.

JKLF has all along been demanding of the governments of Pakistan and Pakistan-occupied Kashmir to change this draconian law as it keeps hundreds of thousands of Kashmiris who support the concept of independence, from contesting or voting in these elections hence grossly violate basic human and democratic rights of Kashmiris. But both governments have so far turned deaf ears to the demand.

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