United Nations, Oct 23: India slammed Pakistan at the UN, reminding the country that it did not even accept the bodies of its own soldiers killed in combat in the 1999 Kargil war but speaks about faith, religious freedom and burials.

The interim report of the Special Rapporteur on freedom of religion and belief, Nazila Ghanea, said that “Reports of systemic denial of funeral rights in the context of individuals killed in security operations in Jammu and Kashmir, India, including denial of return of bodies to families and remote and secret burials, disproportionately affecting Muslims and notably inconsistent with their practices, raise serious concerns.”

“It is deeply ironic that a State that did not even accept the bodies of its own soldiers who were killed in combat in 1999 in Kargil unabashedly speaks with fervor on faith, religious freedom, and burials,” First Secretary at the Permanent Mission of India to the UN Bhavika Mangalanandan said here Thursday, a strong reference to Pakistan.

Indian Army recovered bodies of Pakistani soldiers who died in the Kargil War and provided them with burials after Pakistan refused to acknowledge the involvement of Pakistan Army personnel in the war.

Addressing the interactive dialogue with the Special Rapporteur on freedom of religion and belief on the topic of funeral rights in exceptional circumstances, Mangalanandan reminded Pakistan that it was the Indian Army that buried several Pakistani soldiers with military honours and in accordance with Islamic rights. 

“Pakistan’s deep obsession with what is happening in the Indian Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir should be actually directed at the developments that are underway in the parts of Jammu and Kashmir under its illegal occupation, such as Rawalakot,” she said, adding that in Pakistan, a number of minorities are shrinking; their rights regularly abused.

“A State that cannot ensure the safety of its own minorities has no standing to lecture India,” she said.

Mangalanandan added that burial rights for terrorists are being justified by indicating that States may restrict funeral rights of terrorists, but only within legal limits. 

“Legal limits should be determined in accordance with the principles of sovereign rights. A terrorist not only kills innocent people but damages the psyche of a nation,” she said, adding that the report’s fervent advocacy for the rights of terrorists, who violate the most sacred right of humans – the right to life – does not similarly extend to the victims of terrorism.

“The report goes back half a decade to find references to my country. It fails when it comes to grave violations committed recently in our region and in the developed world,” she said.

Mangalanandan said that as per the report, all discrimination and wrong practices during COVID-19 supposedly took place only in the Global South. 

“What benefit does the report derive by not mentioning similar tragic situations in the developed world? Deriving political mileage out of people’s pain and loss should not be a topic that SRs (Special Rapporteurs) should base their relevance on,” she said.

Beijing, Oct 23: A magnitude 7 earthquake hit China’s Tibet region on Thursday evening, killing at least 16 people, injuring 54 and collapsing hundreds of homes in the northern regional city of Nagqu, official media said.

Search and rescue efforts continued following the collapse of at least 339 homes and 20 livestock sheds, the Nagqu media office said, citing city government officials.

More than 1,600 people from the local county were deployed for rescue efforts. Supplies including 1,000 prefabricated housing units, around 3,000 tents and folding beds, as well as flashlights and winter clothing arrived in the region.

The US Geological Survey said the quake occurred at 10:33 pm local time, with its epicentre 191 kilometres (119 miles) east-northeast of Nagqu, in a sparsely populated, high-altitude area of northern Tibet. It put the earthquake’s depth at 18 kilometres (11 miles).

The US agency recorded at least seven aftershocks with magnitude between 4.3 and 5.2, all of them with a depth of 10 kilometres (six miles), according to its website.

China’s official news agency Xinhua said on Friday that communication in part of the region has been down. Local railway authorities have taken emergency actions to halt trains passing through the region.

The earthquake also caused rockfalls that have forced local authorities to close a section of National Highway 317, allowing only emergency, rescue and official support vehicles through as crews worked to clear debris, according to Xinhua.

Intermittent snows are expected in the earthquake region over the next three days, Xinhua said.

It was the biggest earthquake in the region in the last five years, China’s national broadcaster CCTV said.

Chinese President Xi Jinping called for all-out efforts in rescue operations and medical relief work.

Nagqu is more than 300 kilometres (186 miles) north of Tibet’s capital, Lhasa.