FO condemns continued closure of historic mosque in occupied Kashmir on last Friday of Ramazan

The Foreign Office (FO) said on Friday that Pakistan strongly condemned the continued closure of the historic Jama Masjid in occupied Kashmir’s Srinagar on the last Friday of Ramazan, calling on the international community to take notice.

In a statement, the FO said, “Pakistan strongly condemns the continued closure of the historic Jama Masjid in Srinagar on the last Friday of the holy month of Ramazan.

“Preventing worshippers from offering congregational prayers at one of the most revered mosques in the valley constitutes a serious violation of religious freedom and fundamental human rights in Indian Illegally Occupied Jammu and Kashmir,” it said.

The FO said that for the seventh consecutive year since India had revoked the region’s special autonomy, occupation authorities had “sealed the mosque and barred Kashmiri Muslims from gathering for prayers on this spiritually significant day”.

“Such restrictions on religious practice, particularly during the sacred month of Ramzan, are deeply concerning,” it stated.

The FO called on the international community, including the United Nations and human rights organisations, to take notice of these actions and urge India to ensure the freedom to practice religion as a fundamental human right in the occupied valley.

Earlier in the day, occupied Kashmir’s chief cleric and Hurriyat chairman Mirwaiz Umar Farooq had said in a post on X that the gates of the historic mosque had been “locked from all sides”.

“On the last Friday of holy Ramazan, when tens of thousands gather from towns and villages for prayers and supplication at the historic Jama Masjid Srinagar, its gates have once again been locked from all sides,” he said.

“As Israel has forcibly shut the gates of Masjid al-Aqsa during Ramazan, similar painful reality is witnessed here. Our hearts bleed,” he said.

Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK) Information and Religious Affairs Minister Chaudhry Muhammad Rafique Nayyar also strongly condemned the ban on the offering of Friday prayers at the mosque.

In a statement, he said preventing Muslims from offering Friday prayers at the historic mosque during the holy month of Ramazan was extremely regrettable and an “act of extremism that constituted a blatant violation of not only fundamental human rights but also internationally recognised principles of religious freedom”.

Nayyar said that India, after unleashing some of the worst atrocities in human history in occupied Kashmir, was attempting to suppress the voice of the Kashmiri people through force while continuously curbing their religious and social freedoms.

He said that restrictions on the offering of Friday prayers and banning religious gatherings at mosques in occupied Kashmir exposed the “ugly face of the Indian extremist government”, which, he added, was pursuing a “malicious policy aimed at suppressing the religious freedom and fundamental human rights of Kashmiri Muslims through coercive means”.

He said faith, identity and religious freedom of the Kashmiri people could not be suppressed through force.

The minister urged the international community and global human rights organisations to take immediate notice of the restrictions on religious freedoms and the grave human rights violations in India-occupied Kashmir, and to play an effective role in ensuring that the Kashmiri people were granted their fundamental rights.