On Republic Day, a small crowd gathered in London’s Parliament Square to campaign against India. The leader of the so called “Free Kashmir” protest was Lord Ahmed Nazir, a Labour Party peer and “Chairman of Better Tomorrow Institute for Education (charitable school in Mirpur, Azad Kashmir, Pakistan)”.
Ahmed and a collaborator, Raja Umer Farooq, dragged in some supporters from Nagaland, Punjab, Manipur and the Dalit community as they moved towards the India High Commission in London to call for self-determination in Kashmir. They were greeted by a group of Indians, chanting patriotic slogans. Ahmed’s so-called protest had hired five commercial vans appointed with anti-India propaganda on the sides, which was an attempt to mimic the official Free Balochistan movement banners that appeared on Transport for London buses in 2017.
Ahmed’s house was recently burgled. The Pakistani peer placed the blame on “intelligence services” in a veiled attempt at accusing Mossad or RAW. Ahmed is notorious for being suspended from the Labour Party in 2012; after President Barack Obama offered a reward of £10 million for the capture of LeT terrorist Hafiz Muhammad Saeed. Ahmed retaliated by offering a “bounty” of £10 million for the capture of President Obama and former-President George W. Bush. In October, at an event in London he called Indians “cow piss drinkers”. In his position of president of the All Party Parliamentary Group on Kashmir, Ahmed is a frequent traveler. In 2017, his overseas visits are listed to Milan for Kashmir Solidarity Day; to Oslo to speak at ICC Norway conference; to Los Angeles and Dallas for charity fundraising events; to Toronto for a two-day conference on Kashmir; to Bangladesh to distribute food and money for Rohingya refugees on behalf of Al Mustafa Welfare Trust; to Qatar with a small delegation organised by Arab Organisation for Human Rights in UK; and to Washington DC/Houston and Chicago to raise funds for Rohingya legal work.
The Labour Party appears to be not only anti-Israel (this week Labour advised their MPs to block a blanket ban on Hezbollah) and anti-US (Emily Thornberry, Shadow Defence Secretary called President Trump “an asteroid of awfulness”), but also anti-India. There was not a single Labour MP at the Indian Republic Day celebrations in London on Friday.