Lahore, September 28, 2026: A 20-year-old Azeri woman who was allegedly gang-raped in Lahore recorded her statement under Section 164 of the Code of Criminal Procedure before a judicial magistrate at the Cantonment Courts on Monday.
The woman, who had travelled to Pakistan for business purposes, was allegedly assaulted by three men at a rented flat in a private housing society near Raiwind on the night between Friday and Saturday.
She was brought to the court under tight security to record her statement before Judicial Magistrate Muhammad Sagheer. Before proceedings began, the magistrate directed all unrelated persons to leave the courtroom.
The statement continued for more than an hour.
Defence police registered a case against three unidentified suspects on the woman’s complaint.
On Sunday, Lahore police requested federal authorities to place the names of the three prime suspects on the Provisional National Identification List (PNIL), saying they had fled Lahore shortly after the alleged assault.
A police official said the location of one suspect had been traced to Sialkot. Police also detained two close relatives and a domestic servant of one of the suspects for questioning.
DIG Operations Faisal Kamran said all three suspects had been identified and police teams were working to arrest them.
He said the investigation was being conducted jointly by the Crime Control Department (CCD), operations and investigation wings. The vehicle allegedly used in the incident had also been taken into custody, he added.
Cantt Division SP Investigation Asim Iftikhar was leading the joint police teams investigating the case, another police official said.
The case is the second reported incident involving the alleged gang rape of a foreign woman in the Defence C police station area in the past four months.
In June, two foreign women, nationals of the Netherlands and Venezuela, were allegedly abducted and sexually assaulted in the Defence C police station area.
According to the FIR, five suspects, including a close relative of a senior political personality, allegedly abducted the women, demanded ransom and subjected them to sexual assault during their captivity.
