AWP doesn’t consider Gilgit-Baltistan an ‘integral part of Kashmir’, clarifies President Abid Hassan Manto

London: Awami Workers Party President Abid Hassan Manto has clarified that his party does not consider Gilgit-Baltistan as a “integral, constitutional and historical part of Kashmir”. He has said that a statement attributed to him published in some regional newspapers is misleading.

“AWP considers GB as an independent entity within Pakistan, and that it has no constitutional and legal linkage neither with Kashmir and nor with the Kahmir dispute as the people of GB had liberated their region from Kashmir back in November 1947 and had annexed the region with Pakistan”, he has reiterated.

He has also shared a copy of AWP Manifesto with some youth from GB, wherein on page 28 it has clearly been mentioned that AWP considers Jammu-Kashmir, Azad Kashmir and GB as three separate entities.

The AWP has said that the statement attributed to Abid Manto is baseless and ‘solely amied at sabotaging the election campaign of Comrade Baba Jan.

This is also an attempt to play-down the growing popularity of the leftist class struggle generally in Pakistan and particularly in GB, where people are demanding their basic human and constitutional rights, read a statement shared with the media.

A group of youth from Gilgit-Baltistan raised the issue during the recently concluded international convention of the party in London, responding to which Abid Manto made the clarification.