Islamabad has refused to accept the deportee, saying he renounced his Pakistani citizenship decades ago
UK opposition parties have called for aid and visas for Pakistan to be suspended after Islamabad refused to accept the deportation of a grooming gang ringleader convicted of multiple child sex offenses.
Pakistani-born Shabir Ahmed was a leading figure in the Rochdale gang, which sexually exploited British girls in the Greater Manchester borough during the 2000s. He was released earlier this month after serving 14 years of a 22-year sentence for 30 counts of child rape.
Although Ahmed was stripped of his British citizenship in 2016, the UK government was unable to deport him because the Immigration Act 1971 protects certain Commonwealth citizens who arrived in Britain before 1973 and had lived there for at least five years.
UK Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood has pledged to amend the law in cases of “exceptional severity.” However, Islamabad has refused to accept Ahmed, claiming he renounced his Pakistani citizenship decades ago after destroying his Pakistani passport more than 30 years ago – an act British officials argue did not formally terminate his citizenship.
Despite the Labour government insisting it was doing “everything possible” to deport Ahmed, on Thursday it came to light that the Foreign Office had approved £153 million ($206 million) in development assistance for Pakistan over the next three years. The disclosure triggered a war of words between the ruling party and the opposition.
“Pakistan. No foreign aid. No visas. Until you take back rapist Ahmed,” Reform UK’s deputy leader wrote on X on Friday.
The party’s home affairs spokesman, Zia Yusuf, called the funding proof that Britain’s political establishment “do not care about the British people,” pledging that Reform would immediately suspend aid and visas for Pakistani nationals.
UK Shadow Home Secretary Chris Philp echoed the demand, saying that “vile pedophile child rapists who came here from Pakistan should all be deported back.”
“We should stop all overseas aid and issuance of new visas for Pakistani citizens until they take Ahmed and those like him back,” he added.
Shadow Foreign Secretary Priti Patel likewise condemned the decision, arguing that Labour’s approval of the aid package “tells you all you need to know.”
The British government argued that the aid would help build a safer and more resilient Pakistan, reducing “security and migration risks to the UK.”
Islamabad has maintained that responsibility for Ahmed lies with Britain, where he “grew up, was raised, groomed and, unfortunately, spoiled.”
The Rochdale convictions were among several cases that exposed widespread failures by police and local authorities to protect vulnerable girls and act on repeated reports of organized sexual abuse. A recent report commissioned by Restore Britain MP Rupert Lowe argued that authorities often failed to intervene for fear of being accused of racism.
