Pakistan News: Islamabad to take back sex grooming gang members from UK, wants political rebels too

In a quid pro quo move, Pakistan has reportedly floated a proposal to the UK to accept Pakistani-origin convicted sex offenders from Britain, but wants Britain to hand over some rebels of the regime too. Islamabad said it would accept the return of convicted members of the Pakistani grooming gang, like Qari Abdul Rauf and Adil Khan, in exchange for Britain extraditing two high-profile anti-Asim Munir political dissidents. The two dissidents are Shahzad Akbar, the special assistant to former PM Imran Khan, and Adil Raja, a Pakistani army officer-turner-whistleblower, reported US-based independent outlet, Drop Site News, citing sources.

Both, Shahzad Akbar and Adil Raja have been living in exile in the UK since around April 2022, and are critics of the hybrid regime of Asim Munir-led military and PM Shehbaz Sharif.

Grooming gangs in the UK were networks of predominantly Pakistani men who targeted mostly white minor girls, “groomed” and gang-raped them. These girls were threatened by the Pakistani men and passed on among themselves. The extent of the sex racket shocked the world. One girl was sexually assaulted by 30–40 men in one night.

The Drop Site News report comes just days after Pakistan’s Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi held a meeting with the UK High Commissioner, and weeks after a wave of rumours involving jailed former PM Imran Khan prompted the government to aggressively denounce “fake news” circulating overseas. The report is also significant as British PM Keir Starmer’s government have continued to push for the deportation of Rochdale grooming gang members like Qari Abdul Rauf and Adil Khan to Pakistan.

It was an issue amplified over the past two years by tech tycoon Elon Musk, who claimed that “a quarter of a million” children in the UK were victims.

Until now, progress has been blocked by Pakistan’s longstanding refusal to take the men back and by the convicts’ attempts to renounce their nationality to avoid repatriation.

However, the reported quid pro quo suggests Islamabad might now be willing to break the deadlock only if it gets its hands on the two dissidents it has long tried to silence.

But so far, no mainstream outlet or government source has confirmed the alleged quid pro quo.

A UK-PAK DUAL DEAL THAT CRITICS SAY, ‘PAK WEAPONISING GROOMING GANG MEMBERS’

The alleged proposal emerged after a December 4 meeting in Islamabad between Pakistan’s Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi and UK High Commissioner Jane Marriott. Official statements described the talks as focused on “security cooperation”, tackling “fake news”, and repatriating undocumented Pakistanis.

While the Karachi-based Dawn reported that both parties “discussed the return of Pakistanis illegally residing in the UK”, nothing in the public readouts mentioned grooming gang offenders.

Drop Site News, citing unnamed sources, claimed that Naqvi framed the deportation of Rauf and Khan under the broad category of “Pakistanis illegally residing in the UK”.

Naqvi, according to the Dawn report, also stressed that Pakistan could not allow “slander and defamation against state institutions from those sitting abroad,” referring to Akbar and Raja.

In return for the extradition of Akbar and Raja, Pakistan would issue travel documents for the convicted offenders; the men were stripped of their UK citizenship in 2018 and rendered effectively stateless after renouncing their Pakistani nationality. Their deportation has been stuck ever since in the loophole.

Reacting to Naqvi’s formal submission to the UK High Commissioner, former Imran Khan aide Akbar wrote on X, “It has become increasingly clear that my publications, broadcasts, and political commentary on human rights abuses in Pakistan, the rise of authoritarianism, unconstitutional amendments, and the current impasse over military appointments have deeply angered the regime.”

New York City-based journalist, Waqas Ahmed, who contributed to the report on Drop Site News, said on X, “Normal people do not think like this, but the Pakistani government does. They have finally figured out a way to weaponise British grooming gangs against overseas activists.

A Lahore-based person, Faraz, on X, said, “The Pakistani Government now uses grooming gangs as diplomatic leverage”.

The International Human Rights Foundation condemned what it called “transnational repression”. It described Pakistan’s actions as part of a wider “crackdown on dissent” by the regime. It noted that Raja was “court-martialled in absentia” and handed a 14-year sentence “without prior notice, legal representation, or the right to a defence”, urging UK authorities to consider these violations before acting on Islamabad’s requests.

WHAT IS PAKISTANI GROOMING GANGS? THE STORY SO FAR

Pakistani-origin grooming gangs in the UK were networks of predominantly Pakistani men who, from the 1990s onward, targeted vulnerable girls, mostly white, working-class teens, through coercion, manipulation, and extreme violence.

Victims were “groomed”, trafficked, and gang-raped across towns like Rotherham, Rochdale, Oldham, and Telford. Highly alarming cases include the Hussain brothers’ brutal abuse of dozens of girls, Louise Lowe’s (name changed) rape by more than 100 men, the murder of a Telford-based 16-year-old girl and her family, and Ruby’s (name changed) assault by 30-40 men in one night.

The Rochdale grooming case, dating back to 2012, remains one of the UK’s most politically charged child exploitation scandals. Successive British governments have pushed to deport the offenders, but Pakistan repeatedly refused to accept them, arguing they no longer held Pakistani nationality and posed integration risks. Pakistan has a dual citizenship policy.

Since late 2024, Elon Musk has amplified the grooming gang scandal on X, pledging to fund legal action against “corrupt officials”. Under mounting pressure, British PM Keir Starmer announced a statutory national enquiry in June, but as of December it remains stalled amid several factors, including accusations that Starmer’s Labour Party has abandoned women’s rights.

London-based journalist Naresh Kaushik, who had earlier worked with the BBC and the Associated Press, said the grooming gang scandal involving Pakistani-origin men was “bad news for the UK’s Keir Starmer government”. In his October piece in India Today, Kaushik said, it was “bad news” because growing distrust among abuse survivors, including the resignation of several advisory panel members, showed many now believe the enquiry will be “deliberately watered down” and fear the government is “trying to manipulate” it to avoid real scrutiny of grooming gang abuses.

Currently, Pakistan and the UK have no formal extradition treaty, though Section 194 of the UK Extradition Act 2003 allows for special “ad hoc” arrangements.

The alleged quid pro quo definitely highlights how Pakistan could leverage the grooming gang issue for its gains, putting the UK in a difficult legal and ethical position. With survivors’ trust eroded, no formal extradition framework, and threats of “persecution” of the dissidents back in Pakistan, the alleged deal could further inflame outrage and diplomatic tensions.

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