Deadly clashes in Pakistan-administered Kashmir have brought a long-running dispute over political representation and regional authority back to the center of public life, after at least 11 people were killed in Rawalakot on Sunday ahead of a major protest called by a banned civil society movement.
The unrest has centered on the Jammu Kashmir Joint Awami Action Committee, or JAAC, a grassroots umbrella group representing traders and civil society organizations. Local authorities proscribed the group on Friday under the region’s Anti-Terrorism Act of 2014, accusing it of threatening peace and security. The group’s Tuesday protest went ahead despite federal paramilitary deployments and a travel advisory urging visitors to avoid the area.
Officials and protest leaders have offered sharply different accounts of the violence. Sardar Waheed Khan, commissioner of the Pakistan-administered side of Poonch district, told Reuters that four police officers and a passer-by were killed “after miscreants shot at them,” while six protesters also died. Police Chief Liaqat Malik said 23 security officials and 50 protesters were among more than 70 people injured.
JAAC leader Shaukat Nawaz Mir accused authorities in a video message on X of carrying out violence in Rawalakot, saying, “The state has begun a massacre of our people in Rawalakot.” Khan rejected that characterization, saying the state’s action was intended to restore law and order.
The seat dispute behind the protest
The immediate trigger is a dispute over 12 reserved seats in Pakistan-administered Kashmir’s 45-seat legislature. Those seats are set aside for refugees from Indian-administered Kashmir who live elsewhere in Pakistan; refugees living inside Pakistan-administered Kashmir are not eligible to contest them.
JAAC is demanding that the reserved seats be abolished, arguing that legislative representation should be limited to people who reside in Pakistan-administered Kashmir. The issue carries added urgency because the region is scheduled to vote on July 27 to elect its next legislature.
A top court in Pakistan-administered Kashmir ruled Sunday that the reserved seats are constitutionally protected and that ending them would require a constitutional amendment. Raja Qaiser Ahmed, director of the Area Study Centre for Africa, North and South America at Quaid-i-Azam University in Islamabad, told Al Jazeera the ruling “effectively closed the legal route” for groups challenging the arrangement and intensified JAAC’s calls for protest.
A wider governance argument
Pakistan-administered Kashmir, known locally as Azad Jammu and Kashmir, has its own prime minister and legislative assembly, but Islamabad retains ultimate authority. The territory is part of the disputed Himalayan region claimed in full by both India and Pakistan, with China also controlling a portion. The Line of Control separates the Indian- and Pakistani-administered areas.
Experts cited by Al Jazeera said the latest confrontation is not only about the 12 seats. JAAC’s broader 38-point charter includes demands tied to economic subsidies, corruption investigations, social welfare, infrastructure and political representation. Earlier protests grew out of anger over high electricity bills, alleged flour smuggling and shortages of subsidized wheat supplies.
The movement has repeatedly led to tense confrontations. In May 2024, a JAAC-linked long march toward Muzaffarabad ended in violent clashes that killed at least five people, including a police officer. In September and October 2025, JAAC released its 38-point charter and initiated a lockdown; authorities responded with a complete communications blackout, according to the Al Jazeera account.
Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari, chairman of the Pakistan Peoples’ Party, which holds the most seats in the regional legislature, said Sunday that 35 of the 38 demands had been implemented and that the remaining demands were either not feasible or blocked by court orders. Ahmed said the protests reflect a deeper tension between constitutional arrangements tied to the wider Kashmir dispute and local demands for accountability and political participation.
For now, the next pressure point is whether authorities and JAAC can reopen a political channel after failed talks in late May, or whether the dispute over representation hardens further before the July election.
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