Senate passes resolution seeking release of Dr Aafia Siddiqui from US jail

ISLAMABAD: The Senate on Thursday unanimously passed a resolution seeking serious steps from the government to get Pakistani scientist, Dr Aafia Siddiqui, released from the US prison, ARY News reported.

The resolution was tabled after the Chairman of the House Sadiq Sanjrani suspended routine proceedings.

According to the resolution, ‘this House condemns detention of Dr. Aafia Siddiqui for such a long period…the US authorities were approached many a times for release of Dr Aafia but none of the requests were considered.”

The resolution further said the government should take measures to ensure release of Dr. Aafia Siddiqui from the US prison.

On November 7, the Foreign Office had shared a letter by Dr. Aafia Siddiqui addressed to Prime Minister Imran Khan, seeking his assistance in ensuring her release from the US prison.

Pakistan’s consul general in Houston met Dr. Aafia at the prison where she had handed him over the letter addressed to Mr. Khan.

‘I want to get out of the prison, as my imprisonment in the US jail is illegal,” she writes in the letter.

In June, Foreign Office Spokesperson Dr Muhammad Faisal said Pakistani consul general in the USA held a meeting with incarcerated Dr Aafia Siddiqui where she complained of the mistreatment by US authorities.

The MIT-trained neuro-scientist, Aafia Siddiqui, is serving 86-year prison sentence after being convicted by the US court of seven counts of attempted murder and assault on US military personnel in Afghanistan.