Pakistan rejects India’s claim over Jammu and Kashmir at UN

• Kashmir is a disputed territory under UN resolutions, Pakistani delegate Asif Khan tells UNGA
• Says right of self-determination for Kashmiris remains denied by India for decades
• Final status to be determined via free and impartial UN-administered plebiscite

UNITED NATIONS: Pakistan on Thursday dismissed India’s claim that Jammu and Kashmir is its “integral and inalienable part,” asserting that UN resolutions recognize the Himalayan state as a disputed territory.

“Jammu and Kashmir is not ‘an integral part’ of India, nor has it ever been so under international law,” Pakistani delegate Asif Khan told the UN General Assembly, exercising his right of reply.

He was responding to Indian delegate Eldos Punoose, who protested a reference to the unresolved Kashmir dispute made by Pakistan’s Ambassador Asim Iftikhar Ahmad while commenting on UN Secretary-General António Guterres’ priorities for 2026, presented to the 193-member Assembly.

Punoose, a counsellor in the Indian Mission to the UN, described the Pakistani ambassador’s remarks — highlighting India’s denial of the right of self-determination to the Kashmir people — as “unwarranted.”

Setting the record straight, Asif Khan said India’s arguments were “a tired trope intended to obscure established facts and legal realities.” He emphasized that India has systematically denied the Kashmiris’ right to self-determination for decades, a right affirmed by the Declaration on the Granting of Independence to Colonial Countries and Peoples, while suppressing the population.

The Pakistani delegate stressed that the final status of Jammu and Kashmir must be determined in accordance with the freely expressed will of its people, through a free and impartial plebiscite conducted under United Nations auspices.

“This position is also reflected on official United Nations maps. India accepted these decisions and remains bound to implement them under Article 25 of the UN Charter,” he said.

Asif Khan further noted that since 5 August 2019, India has undertaken measures aimed at altering the demographic composition of the occupied territory, transforming it from a Muslim-majority to a Hindu-majority state, in blatant violation of the Fourth Geneva Convention and international law.