Lord Nazir Ahmed convicted of sexual offences

Published January 6, 2022
A file photo of Lord Nazir Ahmed, a former British parliamentarian of Pak­istan descent. — Photo courtesy BBC
A file photo of Lord Nazir Ahmed, a former British parliamentarian of Pak­istan descent. — Photo courtesy BBC

A BRITISH court convicted Lord Nazir Ahmed, a former British parliamentarian of Pak­istan descent, on Wednesday of sexual offences against two children in the 1970s.

According to the BBC, the court found Lord Ahmed guilty of a serious sexual assault against a boy and the attempted rape of a girl. The Sheffield Crown Court heard the repea­ted sexual abuse happened in Rotherham, Yorkshire, when the former MP was a teenager.

The 64-year-old had denied the charges.

Judge Mr Justice Lavender will decide later when Lord Ahmed will be sentenced.

Prosecutor Tom Little told the court Nazir Ahmed had attempted to rape the girl in the early 1970s, when the defendant was aged 16 or 17 but she was much younger. The attack on the boy, who was aged under 11 at the time, also happened during the same period.

Mr Little said Lord Nazir Ahmed claimed the allegations were a “malicious fiction”, but a phone recording of a 2016 conversation between the two victims showed they were not “made-up or concocted”.

The woman’s call was prompted by an email from the male victim saying: “I have evidence against that paedophile,” the jury previously heard.

Published in Dawn, January 6th, 2022

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