Former South Carolina governor and Republican chief Nikki Haley on Friday blasted the progressive Democrats who skipped Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s speech at US Congress over rights points, saying they boycott India’s democratically elected chief however aspect with “Palestinian terrorists and socialist dictators.”
Progressive Reps. Cori Bush, Jamaal Bowman, and Summer time Lee (D-Pa.) joined fellow Democrats Rashida Tlaib, Ilhan Omar and Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez in boycotting the prime minister’s speech in US Congress citing allegations of abuse of Indian dissidents and minorities, particularly Muslims. US Senator Bernie Sanders mentioned Modi’s “aggressive Hindu nationalism” has “left little house for India’s spiritual minorities.”
“AOC and the Squad boycotting India’s democratically elected chief whereas they aspect with Palestinian terrorists and socialist dictators is precisely on model. What a humiliation,” Nikki Haley mentioned in a tweet.
Earlier this yr, Haley grew to become the primary main Republican challenger to Trump when she kicked off her marketing campaign on February 15 in Charleston. She is the one lady within the GOP area.
At a joint press convention on Thursday, PM Modi denied that discrimination in opposition to minorities existed beneath his authorities. When requested about steps he was prepared to take to “enhance the rights of Muslims and different minorities in your nation and to uphold free speech,” Modi urged they didn’t have to be improved.
“Our Structure and our authorities, and we have now proved democracy can ship. Once I say ship – caste, creed, faith, gender, there isn’t a house for any discrimination (in my authorities),” Modi informed reporters.
The UN human rights workplace described a 2019 citizenship legislation as “essentially discriminatory” for excluding Muslim migrants. Critics have pointed to anti-conversion laws that challenged the constitutionally protected proper to freedom of perception and the revoking of Jammu and Kashmir’s particular standing in 2019 as effectively.
There has additionally been the demolition of properties owned by Muslims within the identify of eradicating unlawful development; and a ban on carrying the hijab in lecture rooms in Karnataka when the BJP was in energy in that state.
“The safety of the Muslim minority in a majority Hindu India, that’s one thing value mentioning,” former US President Barack Obama informed CNN in an interview aired on Thursday.
“If you don’t defend the rights of ethnic minorities in India, then there’s a robust risk that India sooner or later begins pulling aside,” Obama mentioned of what he would have informed Modi now.
(With Reuters inputs)