Influential Kashmiri separatist leader Syed Ali Shah Geelani said on Sunday that acts of arson and violence witnessed here on Saturday or earlier were “unacceptable” and blamed these “vested interests” and other “unscrupulous” elements.
He said, “Such imprudent acts only bring a bad name to our just struggle for freedom and national salvation and I suspect elements bent upon to sabotage it are responsible,” he said in a statement issued from his Srinagar residence besieged by the police since Saturday afternoon when the octogenarian leader was released from a three day long detention on the eve of Id-ul Fitr.
Mr Geelani, however, condemned police move to lodge FIRs against Mirwaiz Umar Farooq and six others for fuelling violence. “The only mirrors frustration on part of the government. I believe that the Mirwaiz has not committed any crime or offence. The so-called government is bent upon to suppress the ongoing movement. I strongly condemn the FIR against the Mirwaiz and others,” he said.
He also condemned torching of a government buildings here on Saturday and said, “There is no place for such activities in our movement. Kashmiris are peacefully demanding their right to self-determination and such actions is an attempt to malign our movement.”
He was aghast at the authorities clamping curfew in Srinagar.