A group of European parliamentarians visited Kashmir on October 30th. The government informed the winter session of parliament on Wednesday, that the 23 Member of Europian Parliament (MEPs) were on a ‘private visit’ after the revocation of article 370 in August. They wanted to understand how terrorism is affecting India and how it has been a challenge for India.
“The government of Jammu and Kashmir has reported that a group of 27 members of Europian Parliament (MEPs), who belonged to different political parties including ruling and opposition parties, paid a private visit to India from October 28, 2019 to November 1, 2019 at the invitation of International Institute for Nonaligned Studies, a Delhi based think tank,” Union Minister of State for Home G Kishan Reddy said in a written statement in the winter session of Rajya Sabha.
He was responding to the set of questions that wanted to know which institution organized and bore the Kashmir tour expenses. Whether the central government was working with the institution which organized it. To another question whether the Union government has “distracted” from its policy of not allowing any external intervention on the Jammu-Kashmir issue. “India’s consistent position has been that issues, if any, with Pakistan are discussed only bilaterally. There is no scope for any third party role or mediation,” the minister said.
The Indian MPs from opposition parties were not allowed to visit Kashmir Valley over security concerns.
“Such exchanges promote deeper people to people contact and ultimately it feeds into the larger relationship which any two countries would like to develop,” he further added.
27 Members of the Europian Parliament(MEPs) came to India and only 23 MEPs went to Kashmir.