Pakistan has told Ed Miliband that it will not take back Shabir Ahmed, a convicted ringleader of the Rochdale rape gang, despite him being born in Pakistan and stripped of his British citizenship. The Telegraph has more.
In a meeting on Thursday, Mohammad Ishaq Dar, Pakistan’s Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister, told the Foreign Secretary that there was no existing law or bilateral mechanism between the two countries that would allow for the transfer of child rapists such as Shabir Ahmed to Pakistan.
Dar said Pakistan would consider the UK’s request, but sources indicated that the only way a deal could be reached was if the UK handed over Pakistani dissidents currently resident in the UK – a move to which the UK is unlikely to agree.
“We currently do not have any legislation or formal mechanism under which we can take him back,” the Pakistani side told the British officials, according to sources briefed on the discussions.
Ahmed, 73, was freed from prison last month after serving 14 years of his 22-year prison sentence for 30 child rape offences.
Shabana Mahmood, the Home Secretary, has announced she will change 50 year-old immigration laws to close a loophole that had prevented the Home Office from deporting the Pakistan-born rapist, even though he had been stripped of his British citizenship.
Pakistan, however, is refusing to take him back, saying that he has renounced his Pakistani citizenship, has spent virtually his entire life in the UK and is therefore Britain’s responsibility.
Miliband is understood to have personally raised Ahmed’s case with Dar during talks at the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office in London and asked that Pakistan consider taking him back.
The Foreign Secretary explained the importance of Ahmed’s removal from Britain and conveyed the Government’s concerns about the convicted child rapist remaining in the country, said a trusted source.
The Ministry of Justice is spending thousands of pounds on accommodating Ahmed, who is subject to electronic tagging, geographical exclusion zones for Oldham, where he lives, and Rochdale, where he committed many of his crimes, strict 24/7 supervision at a bail hostel, and a ban on associating with contacts. …
Pakistan has previously warned it would withdraw co-operation in taking back illegal migrants if Britain tried to force it to accept Ahmed.
It is understood Pakistan officials are particularly aggrieved at previous suggestions by government sources that the UK is prepared to impose sanctions, including visa bans on Pakistanis seeking to come to the UK and withholding foreign aid, if Pakistan continues to refuse to take Ahmed back.
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Why only 14?
Labour’s outrage and indignation on this has always been performative. It is struggling to hold onto its Muslim vote and won’t do anything that might upset that further such as stopping aid or visas. The party always comes before the country.
Labour are not going to call an election and lose control of the country. So what can the Muslims do to them actually. Voting against the party will only benefit Reform and/or the conservatives
An open helicopter door over Karachi would do the trick.
Helicopter : low capacity and high operating cost per passenger.
C-130 with rear ramp down : high capacity and much lower operating cost per passenger.
No more aid, no more visas, restrictions on remittances (nobody receiving public assistance allowed to send remittances anywhere).
Simples.
Uppity bastards.
He will walk the streets, a constant reminder of the incompetence and powerlessness of the British government.
I don’t like Trump. But I have a feeling he would have deported the bastard one way or another, with our without the cooperation of the Pakistani authorities.
Find a pretext bang the bastard up again.
He is on licence, so only need put one foot wrong.
Trump did pull a fast one recently. “You must apply for your H1b visa from your home country.” Thousands dutifully left to do this and then he rescinded the visas. Yoink! 😏
Why was he freed? Is he no longer a danger? Not even in his attitude and guidance to younger members of his family? So what if his 22 year sentence would mean he’d be 81 by the time it was done?
Yes I don’t see why the government didn’t opt for the simple method of just making him serve his entire sentence, then there would be no need for Pakistani cooperation.
Plane, parachute, door, boot. Sorted.
Parachute..? Optional, I believe…
As long as he promises to send the parachute back.
More seriously, is this country so weak we can’t safely land a person on a beach in Pakistan?
Aggrieved are they. Not as much as the British people but likely a lot more than the elites.
If he has renounced his Pakistani nationality, then we should find him a bit of British Territory to live on. Maybe the Chagos Islands?
St Helena was useful for isolation once. Where are the other bits of UK territory or has Uniparty given them all away with a decades long dowry.
Rockall?
“Aggrieved”, are they? At the mere suggestion of the UK cutting All Foreign Aid to Pakistan? And banning all visas for them?
Go for it!
Straightforward management of the problem. No more Aid (of any sort) to Pakistan if they refuse to take him back, along with all the other Pakistani criminals resident here, and no Visas issued to Pakistani politicians or civil servants. And then the final essential ingredient : viz. the backbone and determination to stick to this policyuntil the Pakistani government agrees to our request. The chances of this happening under a Liebour (or Tory) government are, of course, zero.
Why exclude only politicians and civil servants from future UK visas. Exclude everyone with a Pakistan passport unless there is some specific reason their temporary presence here would be of advantage.
Allow a modest sized diplomatic staff.
Absolutely.
And end commonwealth voting.
And all dual nationals to lose their british citizenship.
And trade sanctions.
I wish we could have elon musk negotiating for us.
Pakistan – a country where 25% of the workforce are children, where indentured labour is still commonplace (including outright slavery), where around a thousand girls are abducted annually and forcibly married and where girls are often married off to settle family disputes. Why on earth do we still give aid to this country? It’s high time we purged our Civil Service of those who have allowed this situation to develop and started asking our elected representatives.
(On the other hand, I know of Pakistani Christians who have come here seeking sanctuary, and are treated less compassionately by the UK authorities – regularly hassled. It has also been evidenced that we are unable to provide safety to the higher profile victims of Pakistan’s judicial system).
Apparently some high-profile cricketers (such as David Gower) are petitioning for the release from house arrest of Imran Khan. Good luck, but given Khan did nothing to alleviate the situation of minorities while in power, perhaps he needs to understand what that means for so many of his people.
Why are we sending aid to Pakistan? Have they got a currently evolving natural disaster?
No that would be the paltry £5 million going to Nepal for disaster relief (2 million from the whole EU), versus £153 million to Pakistan (over three years), where the only humanitarian crisis is self inflicted.
Yes; their successive governments and prime ministers. A very similar disaster to the one that has befallen us here in the UK. The only difference is that Pakistan doesn’t send us any aid, only rapists and other assorted criminals.