Gang leader WON’T be deported
ARINGLEADER of the Rochdale grooming gang has avoided being deported and it would therefore be wrong to deport two other gang members fighting to stay in the UK, an Immigration Tribunal has heard.
Abdul Aziz, 51, referred to by the gang as The Master, was told by the Home Office that despite losing an appeal depriving him of UK citizenship, the first step before deportation to Pakistan, he would not in fact lose his citizenship and was allowed to remain in the UK.
Aziz, Adil Khan, 51 and Qari Abdul Rauf, 52, were among nine gang members jailed in 2012 for a catalogue of child sex offences in Rochdale.
All three were liable to be deprived of UK citizenship and deported as they also held Pakistani nationality, and then-home secretary Theresa
May ruled it would be “conducive to the public good”.
Since release from jail they have fought a long legal battle against deportation, mounting multiple legal challenges and appeals, spanning several years, on the grounds that deportation would interfere with their human rights.
As Rauf and Khan continued their appeal against deportation at an Immigration Tribunal, it emerged Aziz had already been told he will not be stripped of his UK citizenship and deported.
Aziz had renounced his Pakistani citizenship on July 13, 2018, six years after he was jailed, but just days before the Court of Appeal ruled he could be deprived of his UK citizenship.
Rauf and Khan only renounced their Pakistani citizenship in September of the same year after the Court of Appeal ruling.
Lawyers for Rauf, who is legally aided, said the law demands consistency of treatment and although