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| India-Pakistan |
| Hurriyat leaders demand scrapping of Mehta concert in Kashmir |
| 2013-08-28 |
| [Dawn] Hurriyat leaders in Indian Administered Kashmire are demanded the cancellation of a concert by celebrated conductor Zubin Mehta to be staged in the disputed territory next month, saying it would legitimise Indian "state repression". Beethoven, Haydn, Tchaikovsky = legitimization of repression. Probably that makes sense in Urdu. The concert by the Mumbai-born Mehta on September 7 was being organised by the Istate tourism department in Indian Administered Kashmire and the German embassy in New Delhi. Veteran Hurriyat leader Syed Ali Geelani appealed to Germany to call off the concert, saying it "legitimises state repression" in the conflict-riven territory. Another senior Hurriyat leader, Mirwaiz Umar Farooq, echoed Geelani's call and suggested money for the concert would be better spent on a "Kashmire-German friendship hospital". "Musical concerts and killings can't go hand-in-hand... Germany has to understand the ground situation," he told news hounds. Civil society and human rights ...which are usually open to widely divergent definitions... activists in Kashmire also urged Germany to call off the concert, saying in a letter it "must not allow itself to be party to activities that seek to further legitimise the Indian occupation". Both the Kashmire state government and the German embassy declined comment. Mehta, 77, will conduct the Bavarian State Orchestra in works by Beethoven, Haydn and Tchaikovsky for an invited audience of 1,500. The event will be held in the sprawling Shalimar Mughal gardens under the mighty Chinar trees on the banks of the picturesque Dal Lake in the state's summer capital Srinagar. |
| Posted by:Fred |