News summary produced by Claude AI
Pakistan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs has stated its opposition to the United Kingdom’s attempts to deport Shabir Ahmed, a man released from prison earlier this month after serving time for his role as ringleader of a Rochdale grooming gang. Tahir Andrabi, a spokesman for the ministry, characterized the matter as purely internal to the UK and said Pakistan bears no responsibility for Ahmed’s case.
Ahmed was convicted in 2012 of multiple rape and sexual offence charges related to the exploitation of girls as young as 13 at takeaway restaurants in the Rochdale and Oldham areas. He came to the UK in the late 1960s and held dual British-Pakistani citizenship until his UK passport was revoked following his conviction. He was sentenced to 22 years in prison. The Pakistani government’s position is that Ahmed, having spent his entire adult life in the United Kingdom and having committed his crimes on British soil, should be handled exclusively by British authorities according to UK law.
Current legislation dating from 1971 prevents the deportation of Commonwealth citizens who arrived in the UK before 1973 and maintained residence for five years. Ahmed meets these criteria, creating a legal barrier to his removal. The UK government has proposed amending this law to allow deportation of foreign nationals convicted of serious crimes, bringing deportation law into alignment with citizenship removal law. Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood stated this week that the 1971 Act protections should not apply in cases such as Ahmed’s.
Following his release, Ahmed was placed in staffed accommodation with a GPS monitoring tag and must adhere to strict licence conditions or face return to prison. Conservative opposition figures have suggested the government consider withholding overseas aid to Pakistan or imposing visa sanctions on Pakistani nationals to pressure acceptance of Ahmed’s deportation. However, Pakistani officials maintain the government has no involvement in the matter and cannot be associated with decisions regarding Ahmed’s legal status.