Sexual Abuse and Exploitation — [Mr Philip Hollobone in the Chair]

Part of the debate – in Westminster Hall at 10:15 am on 4 November 2020.

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Photo of Fiona Bruce Fiona Bruce Conservative, Congleton 10:15, 4 November 2020

I will be brief. It is always a pleasure to honour my friend, Jim Shannon. I support what he has said and I deeply respect the contributions that have been made by other eminent Members, including my hon. Friend Mrs Latham, Sarah Champion and my right hon. Friend Mrs Miller. I want to take a slightly different line, because I do not want to repeat what they have already said with such gravitas.

I want to focus for a moment on the abuse that has been suffered by women and girls in Pakistan, a country to which the UK pays an estimated £383,000 per day in aid. Many are very young girls from minority groups who are abducted, forcibly married and sexually abused—girls like Huma Younus, who was 14 at the time of her abduction, Maira Shahbaz, who was 14 at the time of hers, and Saneha Kinza Iqbal, who was 15. The list goes on. Research suggests that approximately 1,000 such girls, often from religious minorities, are abducted and sexually abused in Pakistan every year. Unfortunately, not many will see justice.

Should we really be paying a reported £383,000 per day in British taxpayers’ money by way of aid—that adds up to £2.8 billion over 20 years—to a country where the rights of so many women are trampled on, where the rights of minorities are ignored, and where there is no freedom of speech or belief, as enabled by Pakistan’s unacceptable blasphemy laws? Can we allow that to continue without calling it out at the highest level as part of the FCDO strategy and on the ground?

I want to talk a little bit more about Maira Shahbaz. The details come from Aid to the Church in Need, which I commend for its reliable information. I have had the privilege of working with that organisation for 10 years. Aged 14, Maira was abducted during the covid lockdown. She was taken from her home in Madina Town, Pakistan, in April this year. She was bundled into a car at gunpoint by three men—a 14-year-old girl. Her life was suddenly turned upside down. She was filmed and photographed being raped and then forced to convert to Islam and marry one of her abductors. In a statement to the police, she said:

“They threatened to murder my whole family. They have also shown me my naked video and pictures which they have taken on their mobile while raping me.”

She was placed in a shelter for women and girls, but what is really shocking is that when her case was heard in court, the Lahore High Court judge determined that she should be returned to her abductor. She actually had to return to his home. Fortunately, however, she managed to escape. Her lawyer states:

“Maira’s life is in constant danger because she is condemned as an apostate by her abductor and his supporters. Unless Maira and her family can leave Pakistan they will always be at risk of being killed.”

Aid to the Church in Need has launched a petition on her behalf. Her case is ongoing, but she is now forever in danger in her home country. There is the threat of honour killing. Extremists in Pakistan have said that they will kill her at the first chance. Her lawyer has said that men are looking for her, knocking on doors and asking for her whereabouts.

That is all happening while the UK Government continue to pay millions of taxpayers’ money to Pakistan. We need to ask some really important questions. What is being done to protect these vulnerable minority women and girls? How is some of the money being used to support them? What are our aid workers doing on the ground to address this issue? It is not a small issue—thousands of young women are affected. What challenges are our Government making to a judicial system that returns the abused to her abuser? Are the Government putting in place strategic plans to address the issue? To which projects does UK aid contribute to support these vulnerable women and girls? What effective challenges have been made by the UK Government against the utterly unjust blasphemy laws, so often cited to justify such atrocities? Why should such enormous amounts of money continue to be paid to a country that so blatantly fails to address such breaches in fundamental human rights?