ISLAMABAD: Pakistan has decided to approach the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) to investigate human rights violations and the recent wave of violence against civilians in India-held Kashmir (IHK) by Indian forces.

“We have requested UNHRC to send a fact-finding mission to India-occupied Kashmir and probe recent killings of innocent Kashmiris,” Adviser to Prime Minister on Foreign Affairs Sartaj Aziz told journalists during a weekly briefing at the Foreign Office on Thursday.

He urged the international community to take notice of the situation in Kashmir and extend its support to the Kashmiri people.

The adviser rejected an Indian claim that the violence in Kashmir is India’s internal matter.

“It is not their internal matter because Kashmir issue is recognised under the United Nations,” Aziz said.

Aziz accused India of using state-sponsored terrorism to justify illegal occupation over Kashmir but stressed that India will not be able to legitimise its occupation.

When asked why Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif is not using his personal ties with Indian PM Narendra Modi to try and diffuse the situation in Kashmir, the adviser said PM Nawaz’s personal ties with Modi are not state ties.

He said Pakistan fully backs All Parties Hurriyet Conference  leader Syed Ali Geelani’s four-point formula on Kashmir.

When asked why the government has been unable to convene an all parties conference  on Kashmir violence, Aziz said political consensus already existed among all political parties on Kashmir, hence there was no need to convene the meeting.

The largest street protests in recent years erupted in held Kashmir after Indian troops on July 8 killed Burhan Wani, the popular 22-year-old leader of Hizbul Mujahideen.

Police and paramilitary soldiers in riot gear enforced a strict curfew for the 12th straight day Wednesday as life remained paralysed and streets deserted in the region.

During the recent protests, clashes between the Indian forces and Kashmiris left at least 47 people, mostly teens and young men, dead.