LAHORE: The Tehreek-i-Tahafuz-e-Ayin-e-Pakistan (TTAP) Punjab on Wednesday demanded court-supervised arrangements to secure video testimony of two foreign women in the abduction and assault case, saying that investigation must resolve the contradiction between the “victims” judicial statements and the police account of their recovery.

In a joint statement issued after a court extended the physical remand of the four principal accused by five days, TTAP chief organiser Ammar Ali Jan and information secretary Shayan Bashir said that according to the women’s statements before a judicial magistrate, after the vehicle carrying them crashed, bystanders came to help, and the first police officers they met allegedly tried to take them to the airport rather than immediately treating them as crime victims.

On the other hand, they say, the police claimed to have rescued them quickly.

The leaders say that as both accounts could not be true, investigators must determine which one is factual.

They said that the outcome of the case would decide whether the province’s police could investigate the powerful in the way they interrogate the powerless.

They stated that the main accused had been mentioned in reports as a relative of a high office holder in the country, and that the statements on record allege abduction, assault and payment of US$100,000 before the women’s release.

They demanded protected video testimony arrangements for the women, so the prosecution could not collapse for want of witnesses, and asked that every officer involved in the first response be identified on the record and that the conduct of that response be examined alongside the crime itself.

Published in Dawn, July 9th, 2026