Pakistan has reportedly offered to take back grooming gang leaders in exchange for Britain handing over Pakistani political dissidents living in the UK.
Pakistani media reported that the proposal was made in a private meeting last Thursday in Islamabad between Pakistani Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi and Jane Marriott, the British high commissioner. Naqvi reportedly urged the UK to hand over anti-government figures Shahzad Akbar and Adil Raja.
Akbar, who was a minister in Imran Khan's government, and Raja, a former army major, are both living in the UK. They have both strongly criticized the Pakistani government over its alleged human rights abuses and suppression of political dissent.
The British government has previously requested that Pakistan extradite Adil Khan and Qari Abdul Rauf, who were jailed in 2012 as ringleaders of a grooming gang that sexually assaulted and abused 47 girls over two years in Rochdale.
Both Khan and Rauf, Pakistani immigrants, were stripped of their British citizenship after being convicted. But days before a judge ordered them to be deported to Pakistan, they renounced their Pakistani citizenship. Pakistan has since refused to accept them.
According to Pakistani media, the Pakistani government said it would accept Khan and Rauf if the UK hands over dissidents Akbar and Raja.
'Unprecedented and deeply disturbing'
This comes as the Labor government is facing mounting pressure to take further action on child sexual exploitation. Its attempts to set up a nationwide inquiry into grooming gangs have faced repeated delays and debates about how wide its scope should be.
Conservative Party leader Kemi Badenoch said on Monday the inquiry must "consider the role of ethnicity, religion and other cultural factors" and should "leave no stone unturned".
It is thought that Britain is highly unlikely to agree to the reported Pakistani proposal, and the Home Office and Foreign Office have declined to comment on the reports.
Raja, now a freelance journalist, told The Telegraph that the report "is unprecedented and deeply disturbing. It shows the extent to which an authoritarian regime is willing to go to suppress dissent".
"I have broken no UK law. My only 'offence' is practicing journalism and exercising free expression," he said. "I trust that the UK, a country committed to the rule of law and press freedom, will not allow political critics to be traded away under pressure from a foreign government."
Former Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan was ousted from government in April 2022 through a parliamentary no-confidence vote following a fallout with the country's influential military.
He has spent more than two years in prison. Last year a UN report concluded that his detention is arbitrary and in contravention of international law.
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