Afghan envoy’s daughter: Pakistan refutes again claims of Silsila’s abduction

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan, on Wednesday, once again refuted the claims of the alleged abduction of Afghan envoy’s daughter, and hoped the Afghan government to respond to its earlier quest of giving access to the complainant, her mobile data, and the Afghan embassy’s official, who was accompanying her on the day of incident, July 16, 2021.

Foreign Office spokesperson Zahid Hafeez Chaudhri, while responding to the recent statement by the Afghan Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the video statement of Silsila Alikhel, the daughter of Afghan ambassador to Pakistan, which appeared on the social media on Wednesday, rebutted the claims made and stated that on the basis of the complete investigation, the Afghan delegation which recently visited Islamabad was informed that the complaint did not corroborate the findings on the ground.

“We have seen the Afghanistan Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ statement and the complainant’s video. It is once again highlighted that the visiting delegation was given a comprehensive briefing on each aspect of the complaint,” he said.

He said the Pakistan side facilitated the delegation’s visit to all areas, which the complainant had independently visited on 16 July, including F-7, G-7, Rawalpindi, Daman-e-Koh, F-6, and the F-9 Park.

Chaudhri further said the delegation was informed that the technical data (geo-fencing) matched with the actual movement of complainant on the day contrary to statement of the complainant, which was further confirmed by the statements of the taxi drivers.

“The delegation was further requested to facilitate access to the complainant and the official of the Embassy and phone data, as already requested on 18 July 2021. It is hoped that the government of Afghanistan would cooperate in expeditious provision of the earlier requested information,” he added.

The Afghan Ministry of Foreign Affairs, in a statement on Tuesday, maintained that “the hospital and medical reports along with other available evidence clearly indicate that Silsila Alikhel had been abducted and tortured.”

“The government of Afghanistan, in coordination with the victim, is ready and will continue to cooperate to identify and apprehend the perpetrators…Ministry of Foreign Affairs once again calls on the Pakistani government to focus on expeditious identification, apprehension, and prosecution of the perpetrators of the abduction,” the statement stated, adding that “Pakistani officials pointed at a different version of the case, and unfortunately did not address the basic issues such as how the incident took place and the identification of the perpetrators.”

Silsila Alikhel also released a video statement on Wednesday in which she once again repeated the same claims of abduction and torture, urging the government of Pakistan to apprehend the ‘perpetrators.’

Copyright Business Recorder, 2021