Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad has hit out at New Delhi for invading and occupying Indian Occupied Kashmir (IOK) despite United Nations resolutions deeming it as a disputed territory.
The Malaysian premier was addressing the 74th United Nations General Assembly (UNGA), where he called for settling the Kashmir dispute between India and Pakistan through “peaceful means”.
In his address to the 193-member Assembly on Friday evening, he said there may be reasons for New Delhi’s Kashmir move; however, it is still wrong.
“The problem must be solved through peaceful means,” Mahathir said, adding, “Ignoring the UN would lead to other forms of disregard for the UN and the rule of law.”
On the lingering question of Palestine, Mahathir said the first action of the UN was the creation of the state of Israel, seizing Arab land and expelling 90 per cent of the Arab population.
The result was terrorism when there was none before, or not on the present scale, he said.
Mahathir acknowledged that Malaysia accepted Israel as a fait accompli but could not accept Jewish settlements or occupation of Jerusalem.
Muslims, he said, were accused of terror even if they did nothing, and their states were destabilised by regime change.
The prime minister said there were no massive migrations in the past, but now wars and regime change forced people to flee their countries.
Noting that democracy was not the easiest form of government to operate, especially when it was adopted overnight, he called for time for gradual change. Otherwise, he added, the result was violence, civil wars or new more harsh regimes.
Turning to the fate of the Rohingya people in Myanmar, he noted many colonies in the West had expelled natives from their countries, but never as brutally as in Myanmar.
