SOUTH ASIA - House Foreign Affairs Committee Democrats

2223The Ministry of Home Affairs reported that 744 suspected militants were arrestedin 1999 and 109 persons surrendered. In comparison, according to the Jammu andKashmir police, 1,228 suspected militants were arrested in 1998 and 187 personssurrendered. Human rights organizations allege that the decline in the number ofmilitants arrested from 1998 to 1999 is consistent with reports that security forcesare killing many militants captured in ‘‘encounters’’ (see Section 1.a.); that patterncontinued during the year. Of those arrested and who surrendered in 1998, 529 personswere released after preliminary questioning, 457 persons were charged underspecial security laws, and the remaining persons were released at a later stage ofjudicial review. In addition the Jammu and Kashmir police stated that in 1998 itheld 514 persons under the Public Safety Act (PSA). According to an Amnesty Internationalreport that was released during the year, there are between 700 and 800unsolved disappearances in Kashmir since 1990. The Home Ministry reported thatsecurity forces in the northeastern states arrested 1,413 suspected militants in1999; an additional 1,080 militants surrendered during that year. In comparison1,485 suspected militants were arrested and 267 persons surrendered in 1998. TheGovernment was unable to provide complete statistics for the number of personsheld under special security laws in the northeastern states, but acknowledged that43 persons were in detention under the National Security Act as of December 31,1998. Although the Government allowed the Terrorist and Disruptive Practices (Prevention)Act (TADA) to lapse in 1995, human rights organization credibly reportedthat more than 1,000 persons remained in detention awaiting prosecution under thelaw. Several thousand others are held in short-term (1 day to 6 months duration)confinement in transit and interrogation centers.Human rights groups maintain that several hundred more persons are held by themilitary and paramilitary forces in long-term unacknowledged detention in interrogationcenters and transit camps in Jammu and Kashmir and in the northeasternstates that nominally are intended for only short-term confinement. Human rightsgroups fear that many of these unacknowledged prisoners are subject to torture andextrajudicial killing (see Sections 1.a. and 1.c.). According to one NGO, there were1,300 writs of habeas corpus pending in the Jammu and Kashmir High Court in1999. In August Amnesty International reported that the fates of up to 1,000 personsreported missing in Jammu and Kashmir since 1990 remain unexplained byauthorities. The U.N. Special Rapporteur on Torture reported in 1997 that morethan 15,000 habeas corpus petitions have been filed in the country since 1990, ‘‘butthat in the vast majority of these cases the authorities had not responded to thepetitions.’’ In 1999 the Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearancesof the U.N. Commission on Human Rights (UNCHR) transmitted 33 newly reportedcases of disappearance to the Government, 14 of which reportedly occurred in 1998.The Government submitted information on eight cases of disappearance to the workinggroup in 1999.HRW reported that M. Akbar Tantray, an imam of a mosque in Rafiabad, Jammuand Kashmir, was reported missing on February 8. Shortly after his January 30 arrestby an army unit, unit officials told family members that Tantray was not intheir custody. In February the NHRC issued a notice to the Union Defense Secretaryrequiring him to report on the whereabouts of Abdul Rasheed Wani ofBemina, Jammu and Kashmir. According to family members, an army patrol arrestedWani near the Srinagar fruit market on July 7, 1997 and he has not beenseen since. In August Amnesty International appealed to the Government to investigatethe growing number of disappearances in Jammu and Kashmir. The organizationestimated that as many as 1,000 persons had ‘‘disappeared’’ in the state since1990. In September the NHRC issued a notice to the Chief Secretary and DirectorGeneral of Police in Jammu and Kashmir and the Secretaries of the Union Homeand Defense Minisitries requiring them to report on missing persons in the statewithin 8 weeks; however, there was no public information regarding the authoritiescomplied with the directive.In one prominent case in Jammu and Kashmir, the Government responded to theU.N. Special Rapporteur on Extrajudicial, Summary, or Arbitrary Executions in1997, states that human rights monitor Jalil Andrabi was not arrested by securityforces, as alleged by human rights groups, but was abducted by ‘‘unidentified armedpersons.’’ Andrabi last was seen alive in the presence of countermilitants and membersof the security forces on March 8, 1996, in Srinagar. Despite the Government’sstatement, the army in February 1996 identified to a Srinagar court a major witha temporary commission as the individual primarily responsible for Andrabi’s death.Security forces allegedly dumped Andrabi’s body into the Jhelum River. His casealso is the subject of an inquiry by the NHRC. In 1998 an army major was arrestedfor the killing of Andrabi. There was no progress in the case by year’s end, and theaccused major no longer is in detention (see Sections 1.a. and 4). In April 1998, theVerDate 11-MAY-2000 13:46 Sep 20, 2001 Jkt 071555 PO 00000 Frm 00067 Fmt 6601 Sfmt 6621 F:\WORK\COUNTRYR\S71555\71555.035 HINTREL1 PsN: HINTREL1