The chief US diplomat for South Asian affairs, Alice Wells, has expressed concern over continued detentions and internet-shutdown in occupied Kashmir, days before her visit to New Delhi for bilateral talks.<\/p>\n

\u201cClosely following US ambassador to India and other foreign diplomats\u2019 recent trip to Jammu & Kashmir. Important step,\u201d she wrote in a tweet posted on the official website of the US State Department\u2019s Bureau of South and Central Asian Affairs.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe remain concerned by detention of political leaders and residents, and internet restrictions. We look forward to a return to normalcy,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n

Kashmir has no internet access for more than 150 days.<\/p>\n

Wells says Washington closely following diplomats\u2019 visit to Valley<\/p>\n

Ms Wells will reach New Delhi on Jan 15 on a three-day visit that includes talks with senior Indian officials on bilateral and regional issues. She will then proceed to Islamabad on a similar, three-day visit that will begin on Jan 19.<\/p>\n

On Thursday, the Modi government arranged a \u201cguided tour\u201d for some New Delhi-based diplomats to the occupied valley \u2014 the first after India scrapped the region\u2019s autonomous status five months ago.<\/p>\n

\u201cEuropean Union envoys declined an invitation, apparently because the visit did not include meetings with three former chief ministers, who continue to be in detention and whose parties dominated Kashmiri politics,\u201d reported an American broadcaster, Voice of America.<\/p>\n

But US ambassador to India, Kenneth Juster, accompanied the group, which met Indian military officials, politicians and journalists selected by Indian security services.<\/p>\n

India showcased the visit to support its claim that normalcy is returning to the troubled region, where a strict clampdown imposed in August paralysed life as authorities imposed a dusk to dawn curfew. Indian authorities also imposed unprecedented restrictions on both social and conventional media and disconnected cellphones. Indian security forces also arrested hundreds of Kashmiris, including senior politicians. Most of them remain in detention and the internet suspended.<\/p>\n

The diplomats from more than a dozen countries were driven in a motorcade from the airport amid tight security and the areas they visited were also selected by Indian officials.<\/p>\n

\u201cAlthough access for diplomats, rights activists and foreign journalists to Kashmir has always been controlled, India has further restricted travel to the region for both foreigners and Indian opposition leaders,\u201d VOA noted.<\/p>\n

The US broadcaster reported that Indian opposition parties were criticising the government for not allowing their leaders to visit the region while taking diplomats on what they called a \u201cguided tour\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cEssentially, the government wants to demonstrate that everything is normal in Kashmir, which is far from reality,\u201d said Congress Party leader Manish Tewari.<\/p>\n

Besides Ambassador Juster, the diplomats who visited Kashmir represented Norway, Vietnam, South Korea, Brazil, Uzbekistan, Bangladesh and the Maldives.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s all about trying to improve the optics,\u201d Manoj Joshi, a foreign affairs analyst at the Observer Research Foundation in New Delhi told VOA. \u201cAround the world, the government\u2019s handling of the domestic situation has been getting huge amount of negative attention.\u201d<\/p>\n

Although Indian succeeded in \u201cpersuading\u201d Washington to sends its ambassador, \u201cits other good friend France hid behind the European Union decision not to go on the guided tour,\u201d reported an Indian media outlet, ThePrint.<\/p>\n

\u201cBrazilian ambassador to India, Andre Aranha Correa do Lago, didn\u2019t travel to Srinagar although his name was on the list,\u201d the report added.<\/p>\n

DAWN<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The chief US diplomat for South Asian affairs, Alice Wells, has expressed concern over continued detentions and internet-shutdown in occupied Kashmir, days before her visit to New Delhi for bilateral talks. “Closely following US ambassador to India and other foreign diplomats’ recent trip to Jammu & Kashmir. Important step,” she wrote in a tweet posted […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[9],"tags":[1866,4],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pakistanfoemonitor.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8326"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pakistanfoemonitor.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pakistanfoemonitor.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistanfoemonitor.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistanfoemonitor.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8326"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/pakistanfoemonitor.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8326\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pakistanfoemonitor.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8326"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistanfoemonitor.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8326"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistanfoemonitor.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8326"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}