No foreign ruler living in UK has ever been extradited

Now that the incumbent Prime Minister Imran Khan has asked relevant authorities to bring back home one of his predecessors and arch political rivals, Nawaz Sharif, so that he is made to fight the corruption cases pending against him in the local courts, research undertaken by the "Jang Group and Geo Television Network" shows that although only one foreign head of state has till date been arrested on British soil, no ruler has ever been extradited or deported from there.

Chronicles of history reveal that in October 1998, Chile's military dictator, Augusto Pinochet (1915-2006), was arrested in London while he was there for medical treatment.

He was handcuffed under an international arrest warrant issued by a Spanish judge, and not by any court in Chile. Spain had requested Britain to hand over the old, frail and ailing Pinochet.

By the way, the Chilean regime of the time had opposed his arrest, extradition to Spain, and trial. The indictment and arrest of Pinochet was the first time that a former government head was arrested on the principle of Universal Jurisdiction in United Kingdom.

General Pinochet, who ruled Chile from 1973 to 1990, was placed under house arrest initially in the clinic where he had just undergone back surgery, and later in a rented house.

Charges against him included 94 counts of torture of Spanish citizens, the 1975 assassination of a Spanish diplomat and one count of conspiracy to commit torture. It is imperative to note that allegations of abuses had been made numerous times before his arrest, including since the beginning of his rule, but had never been acted upon.

After a hard-fought 16-month-long legal battle ensued in the British House of Lords (Upper House of Parliament), which was then the highest court of the United Kingdom, Pinochet claimed immunity from prosecution as a former head of state under the State Immunity Act 1978.

This claim was rejected by a majority of the Law Lords (3-2), who ruled that some international crimes, such as torture, did not grant a former head-of-state any immunity from prosecution.

In April 1999, former UK Prime Minister, Margaret Thatcher, and former US President, George Bush, had called upon the British government to release Pinochet.

They argued that Pinochet should be allowed to return to his homeland rather than be extradited to Spain.

On the contrary, the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, had hailed the Lords' ruling, declaring that it was a clear endorsement that torture is an international crime subject to Universal Jurisdiction.

The Amnesty International had demanded his extradition to Spain. Media reports suggested Margaret Thatcher had sent Pinochet a bottle of malt whisky, with a note saying "Scotch is one British institution that will never let you down."

Meanwhile, as questions began to emerge in the media about Pinochet’s allegedly fragile health, the-then British Home Secretary, Jack Straw, ruled in January 2000 that the former Chilean dictator should not be extradited to Spain. This triggered protests from Belgium, France, Switzerland and various human rights NGOs, but to no avail as Secretary Jack Straw had ordered that Pinochet had to be set free, and authorized his return to Chile without making him face any trial.

On March 3, 2000, Pinochet returned to Chile.

He died on December 10, 2006 without having been convicted. His arrest in London had made the front pages of newspapers worldwide.