LAHORE: A Pakistani court acquitted 12 men of child sex abuse and blackmail charges on Saturday, the latest verdict in a massive pedophilia scandal that rocked the country in August 2015.
The abuse and extortion scandal, which authorities have called the largest in Pakistan’s history, allegedly involved hundreds of victims in Punjab province.
Two of the accused were jailed for life in April last year.
Judge Chaudhry Ilyas acquitted the men of “sexual abuse of a young boy and making a video to blackmail his family,” a court official told AFP.
Prosecutors produced 16 witnesses against the accused men, but could not prove the charges, the official said. Another court official confirmed the details.
In the village of Hussain Khanwala in Kasur, southwest of Lahore, videos were made of at least 280 children being sexually abused by a gang who blackmailed their parents by threatening to leak the videos.
The police, who had conspicuously failed to act despite pleas from some parents, eventually made dozens of arrests after clashes between relatives and authorities brought the issue into the media spotlight.
In March 2016, Pakistan’s Senate also passed a bill that criminalized sexual assault against minors, child pornography and trafficking for the first time — previously only the acts of rape and sodomy were punishable by law.
Last week a court handed four death sentences to a man charged with raping and murdering a six-year-old girl, in a case that shocked the country and sparked major riots in his home district.
Imran Ali, 24, was on trial for killing Zainab Fatima Ameen in Kasur last month.
He faces further charges in the cases of at least seven other children attacked in the Punjab city — five of whom were murdered — in a spate of assaults that had stoked fears a serial child killer was on the loose.
Ali has confessed to all eight attacks, including the death of Zainab.
Pakistan acquits 12 men accused of child sex abuse
Pakistan acquits 12 men accused of child sex abuse
Pakistan arrests suspect arriving from Cambodia amid crackdown on human smuggling
- Suspect worked at an “online fraud company” in Cambodia, later started smuggling people from Pakistan, says FIA
- Pakistan has intensified crackdown against human smugglers after hundreds of migrants drowned near Pylos in 2023
ISLAMABAD: Pakistan’s Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) on Sunday said it had arrested a key suspect involved in smuggling humans who had arrived from Cambodia, alleging he was also part of an international fraud network.
The suspect, identified as Zainullah, was arrested by FIA officials when he arrived in the southern port city of Karachi from Cambodia.
Zainullah had traveled from Pakistan to Cambodia in September 2024, a press release issued by the agency said.
“He worked at an online fraud company in Cambodia and later became involved as an agent in recruiting individuals from Pakistan,” the FIA said.
The FIA said it recovered images of multiple individuals’ passports, payment receipts and bank transaction records after extracting data from Zainullah’s phone.
It said the suspect received money through personal bank accounts and a cryptocurrency account.
“The suspect has been handed over to the FIA Anti-Human Trafficking Circle, Karachi, for further legal proceedings,” the FIA said.
“Further investigation is underway.”
Pakistan intensified action against illegal migration in 2023 after hundreds of migrants, including 262 Pakistanis, drowned when an overcrowded vessel sank off the Greek town of Pylos, one of the deadliest boat disasters in the Mediterranean.
Authorities say they continue to target networks sending citizens abroad through dangerous routes, following heightened scrutiny at airports and a series of arrests involving forged documents.
Pakistan’s interior ministry said this week illegal migration to Europe has declined by 47 percent this year after its nationwide crackdown, saying that more than 1,700 human smugglers have been arrested in 2025.
