The police in the United Kingdom have warned the exiled Pakistanis against threats saying that their lives were in danger and that they should keep a low profile, according to a report published in The Guardian.
Counter Terrorism Policing, a collaboration of UK police forces and the security services, told possible targets that they need to inform police if they intend to travel within the UK, read the report.
One British-based dissident said she had received information that hitmen linked to drug gangs would be contracted to target her. The heightened alert follows a recent trial in which a London-based hitman was found guilty of conspiring to murder a Pakistani dissident.
The trial heard how Muhammad Gohir Khan was offered £100,000 to kill a political blogger, Ahmad Waqass Goraya in the Netherlands last year.
Read more: UK man had chef's knife to attack Pakistani blogger Waqass Goraya: court
However, the mysterious middleman behind the plot – known as “Muzzamil” – remains at large, with the Metropolitan police yesterday confirming they were still attempting to establish his identity and whereabouts. The Met Police would not comment on whether it was liaising with the Pakistani authorities to locate him.
The report stated that officers have also issued a plea to the public for information on Muzzamil, who speaks with a British accent and, during a voice message heard at the trial, told Gohir that future “jobs” in the UK and Europe would follow after killing Goraya.
Days before the trial started last month, officers from Counter Terrorism Policing, whose brief is to “prevent, disrupt and investigate dangerous extremists”, visited the UK home of Pakistani political commentator Rashid Murad to review his security.
Police have already installed a panic alarm and CCTV at his home and shared guidance on personal security from the national counter-terrorism security office.
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“Two police officers visited my home in 2021, informed me that they had intercepted a communication in which it was revealed that some people were planning to harm me," the report quoted Murad as saying.
His brother, based in Manchester, has also been approached by the British authorities and informed of a potential threat.
Another apparent target, lawyer Fazal Khan, said he had been informed by officers from the Met Police’s counter-terrorism command, SO15, to notify other UK police forces if he intended to travel outside the capital.
The officers, he added, had discussed the mysterious death of Pakistani dissidents such as Karima Baloch, who was found dead in a lake in Canada in 2020.
Ayesha Siddiqa, a Pakistani defence analyst based in London, has also been warned of threats to her life, and revealed that a well-connected lawyer had told her that the method used to target her would involve British-based Pakistani drug gangs. “That sense of being secure is gone,” she said.
Goraya told the Observer that the attempt to kill him was “a transnational crime” in which Khan was merely the tool.
Zar Ali Khan Afridi, a rights campaigner, who fled to the Netherlands after an abduction attempt, revealed he had received a life-threatening call from a British number. “The best thing about moving to Europe was that I thought I would be safe. Now there is always the fear of being attacked, killed or harmed,” he said.
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