SRINAGAR // Police in India have arrested a prominent Kashmiri activist a day after he was barred from leaving the country to attend a session of the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva.
Police picked up Khurram Parvez from his home in the Indian-controlled Kashmir’s main city Srinagar on Thursday night.
Police superintendent Faisal Qayoom confirmed his arrest but did not say what the charges were.
“We are looking into it. For the moment we’ve taken him into custody,” he said.
Mr Parvez could be held for up to six months without charge under India’s Public Safety Act.
On Wednesday, immigration officials at New Delhi’s international airport barred Mr Parvez from boarding a plane to Geneva, even though he had a valid visa and letter of invitation from the UN body.
His arrest comes as the troubled Himalayan region has been hit by some of the most serious anti-India protests in recent years.
Triggered by the killing of a popular rebel leader two months ago, the protests have left more than 80 people dead and thousands wounded, mostly by government forces firing bullets and shotgun pellets to quell the demonstrations.
Mr Parvez and his organisation, the Coalition of Civil Society, were the first to draw attention to thousands of mass graves in remote parts of Kashmir and to demand that the government investigate them to make clear who the dead were and how they were killed.
His organisation has also written scathing reports on cases of brutality involving some of the hundreds of thousands of Indian troops in the region, and has highlighted the widespread powers granted to troops posted in the area, which had led to a culture of impunity and widespread rights abuses.
Kashmir is India’s only state with a Muslim majority and is divided between India and Pakistan. Most people in the state favour independence from mainly Hindu India or a merger with Pakistan.
* Associated Press and Agence France-Presse
