Smuggling of human placentas case: Physical remand of five suspects including Chinese extended

ISLAMABAD: A local court on Tuesday extended the physical remand of five suspects, including three Chinese nationals, in a case related to the smuggling of human placentas.

Judicial Magistrate Ahmed Shehzad Gondal, while hearing the case, further extended physical remand for two days in the case registered under Sections 9 and 11 of the Human Organs and Tissues Transplantation Act, 2010.

The personnel of the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) produced the five suspects, including three Chinese citizens, Li Ganglei, Wang Bao, and Pengfei Gao, as well as two Pakistani suspects, Waqas Sarwar and Qaiser Hanif, before the court seeking an extension for nine days.

During the hearing, the counsel for the two Pakistani accused appeared before the court. The two Pakistani nationals have no involvement in the alleged offence and had been wrongly nominated by the FIA in the case, he argued.

The court, after hearing arguments, turned down theFIA’s plea for a nine-day extension in physical remand and granted only a two-day extension.

As per the First Information Report (FIR), the Human Organ Transplant Authority (HOTA) had received information from a reliable source that activities related to the sale and commercial use of human organs/tissues were being carried out at a house in Sector F-7/1 of Islamabad.

It says that acting upon the verified information, a joint team comprising officers of the FIA Corporate Crime Circle (CCC) and HOTA conducted a raid at the said premises.

During the raid, the premises, which ostensibly appeared to be a private residence, “were found to have been converted into an unauthorized facility for the storage and processing of human placenta.”

Copyright Business Recorder, 2026