Chandigarh: Strongly condemning the dastardly attack on the Sikh vehicle, which has killed 19 people including Avtar Singh Khalsa – the only Sikh candidate who had planned to contest October’s parliamentary elections and Rawail Singh another senior most Afghan Sikh leader, the Dal Khalsa expressed deep shock and anger at the loss of innocent lives.
Party spokesperson Kanwar Pal Singh said minority communities like Sikhs and Hindus have been facing persecution and threats since long in Afghanistan and it was for this reason that a large chunk of the Afghan Sikh population has moved to Delhi and other parts of the world where they have been granted asylum.
Who-so-ever has targeted the convoy killing the Afghan Sikh leadership must be chased and punished, said he. Commenting on the situation in the geo-political situation in Afghanistan, Kanwarpal Singh stated that Afghanistan has been converted to an open battlefield with too many stakeholders, with no direct line of authority and with multiple countries through their secret agencies playing havoc with the lives of the people of all religions and regions.
“We fully comprehend that we, the Sikhs are not the only ones who are under attack, even the Muslim community is” said the spokesperson of the hardliner Sikh body. Today, Afghanistan presents a picture of international political and diplomatic failure with all UN bodies, the powerful US and the European Union having failed to broker peace and stability in the region.
Kanwarpal Singh called upon the Hezb-i-Islami leader Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, who had one time publicly declared his affinity for the Sikhs to comprehensively and conclusively intervene to bring the perpetrators to justice and to drive the point home that Muslims aren’t being at loggerheads with Sikhs.
Pertinently, Hekmatyar once a powerful Afghan warlord returned to the country after striking the deal with President Ashraf Ghani, which was initiated during the Obama administration and finalized last year under the Trump administration.
The Afghan President, Hekmatyar and the United Nations must do all they can for the safety and security of the Sikhs and Hindus that have chosen to reside in Afghanistan, said he.