When a Pakistani citizen is detained in a foreign country, his family back home often discovers a painful truth: the Pakistani state cannot simply walk into a foreign jail and bring him home. But there is something the state must do — it must try. It must take up the case through diplomatic channels, seek consular access, and keep the family informed. And when the Foreign Ministry fails to act on a court order directing it to do exactly that, the courts can hold it to account.
On 22 October 2026, the Lahore High Court issued notices to Foreign Secretary Asim Iftikhar in two contempt petitions, as reported by ADN News, over the alleged non-compliance with a court order concerning two Pakistani citizens — Syed Salman Raza Zaidi and Muhammad Junaid Jahangir — detained in the United Arab Emirates. The case is a window into a body of law most Pakistanis never think about until they need it: the right to consular access, and what your government owes you when you are locked up abroad.
This article reports the proceedings and explains, in plain language, what consular access means under international law, what Pakistan's Foreign Ministry is supposed to do when a citizen is detained overseas, what contempt of court means when an official ignores a court order, and what a family can practically do if a relative is detained abroad. The reporting is confined to the proceedings and the law. As always, this is legal information, not legal advice — for a specific case, consult a lawyer.
What Happened in Court on 22 October
The facts, as reported by ADN News English, are these:
The 14 September order. On 14 September 2026, the Lahore High Court directed the Foreign Secretary to process and decide representations regarding the detentions of Syed Salman Raza Zaidi and Muhammad Junaid Jahangir within 15 days. A "representation" is a formal written request — here, requests asking the Foreign Ministry to take up the cases of the two detained Pakistanis with the UAE authorities. The court's direction was procedural: decide the representations — that is, consider them and give a decision — within a fortnight plus a day.
The hearing. On Thursday, 22 October 2026, Justice Sadiq Mehmood Khurram heard two contempt petitions. The petitioners were represented by Barrister Abuzar Salman Niazi. The lawyer told the court that the two detainees had been denied access to consular, diplomatic, and legal support. He submitted that despite the passage of considerable time since the court's 14 September directive, the petitioners had received no formal communication regarding the status of their representations. He urged the court to initiate contempt proceedings against the Foreign Secretary for failing to comply with the order.
The outcome. After hearing the initial arguments, Justice Khurram issued notices to the Foreign Secretary — the first formal step that can lead to contempt proceedings if non-compliance is established.
The Background: Two Pakistanis Detained in the UAE
The two men at the centre of the case are described in the ADN News report as Pakistani citizens affiliated with the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI). Some background on their situation has been reported by the investigative outlet DropSite News in an earlier report: the two men had left Pakistan and were living in the UAE — Jahangir working as a marketing manager in a private company in Dubai, Raza settled with his wife in Sharjah — when they were detained by Emirati officials. According to their families, as reported by DropSite, they were given no explanation for the detention, were not allowed a phone call, and the families' attempts to get information from the authorities were met with silence for months.
This background matters because it is the classic shape of a consular case: a citizen of one country is detained in another country, and for weeks or months nobody — not the family, not a lawyer, not the home country's diplomats — can get reliable information about where he is, what he is accused of, or what his condition is. International law has a specific answer to this situation, and it is called consular access.
Consular Access: Your Rights Under International Law
The legal foundation of this entire area is the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations, 1963 — a treaty to which Pakistan is a party, along with almost every country in the world, including the UAE. Article 36 of the Convention is the key provision, and every Pakistani travelling or working abroad should know what it says.
1. The right to be informed. When a foreign national is arrested or detained, the authorities of the host country must inform him without delay of his right to have his country's consular officers notified of the detention.
2. The right to notification. If the detained person asks, the host country's authorities must notify the consular post of his home country that one of its nationals is in custody — and they must do so without delay.
3. The right to communication and visits. Consular officers must be free to communicate with the detained national, to visit him, and to converse and correspond with him. They must also be free to arrange for his legal representation.
4. The purpose. These rights are not ceremonial. They exist because a foreigner in custody is uniquely vulnerable: he may not speak the language, may not know the legal system, may not be able to contact family, and may face pressure he cannot resist. The consulate is his lifeline — it can check on his welfare, ensure he is not being mistreated, help him find a lawyer, inform his family, and monitor whether the proceedings against him meet basic standards of fairness.
What this means in practice. If a Pakistani is detained in Dubai, the Pakistani consulate in Dubai has the right — under international law binding on the UAE — to be notified (if the detenu requests it), to visit him, to speak to him privately, to help him engage a lawyer, and to pass information to his family. A host country that detains a foreign national and then blocks all contact — no phone call, no lawyer, no consular visit, no information to the family — is violating Article 36.
The limits. Consular access is not a get-out-of-jail card. Pakistan cannot order the UAE to release anyone; the UAE's sovereignty over its own territory and criminal process is intact. What Pakistan can demand is access — visits, communication, welfare checks, legal assistance — and fair treatment. The distinction matters: the Foreign Ministry's job is not to spring citizens from foreign jails, but to make sure they are not abandoned in them.
What Pakistan's Foreign Ministry Is Supposed to Do
When a citizen is detained abroad, a machinery is supposed to swing into action. Here is what the system looks like on paper:
1. The embassy or consulate is the first responder. Pakistan's missions abroad maintain lists of detained nationals. Consular officers are expected to visit detainees, check on their welfare, and report back.
2. Representations must be processed. A family member in Pakistan can file a written representation with the Foreign Ministry in Islamabad, asking it to take up the case. The Ministry is expected to forward the matter to the mission concerned, seek a report, and engage the host country's foreign ministry through diplomatic channels.
3. The 14 September order was about this machinery. The Lahore High Court did not order the Foreign Secretary to secure the men's release — it could not, since the men are in another sovereign country's custody. It ordered something more modest and entirely within the executive's power: process and decide the representations within 15 days. In other words: look at the file, take the case up through the proper channels, and give the petitioners a formal answer.
4. Why a "decision" matters. A court order to "decide" a representation does not mean the court has pre-judged the outcome. It means the executive cannot sit on the file indefinitely. Silence — no communication, no status update, no decision — is itself a failure. That is precisely what the petitioners' counsel alleged on 22 October: that considerable time had passed and they had received no formal communication at all.
5. Diplomatic realities. It is fair to acknowledge that engaging a host country on detentions can be diplomatically delicate — states are often reluctant to press allies too hard. But diplomatic difficulty is not a legal excuse for ignoring a court order. If the Ministry faces genuine obstacles, the lawful course is to explain them to the court, not to go silent.
Contempt of Court: What "Notices" Mean — and Don't Mean
The 22 October development is the issuance of notices in contempt petitions. Because the word "contempt" sounds dramatic, it is worth explaining precisely what this step means.
What contempt of court is. Contempt of court, in Pakistan's law (principally the Contempt of Court Ordinance, 2003, read with the Constitution), includes the wilful disobedience of a court order. If a court directs an official to do something by a deadline, and the official simply does not do it, that can be contempt — punishable, in serious cases, with imprisonment of up to six months.
What a notice is. A notice to show cause is the court's way of saying: "We have been told you disobeyed our order. Come and explain yourself." It is not a finding of guilt. The Foreign Secretary will now have the opportunity to respond — to show that the order was complied with, or that there was a lawful reason for the delay, or that compliance is now underway.
What happens next. If the response satisfies the court, the matter may end there. If the court finds wilful, deliberate non-compliance, it can initiate formal contempt proceedings, which can lead to a conviction and punishment. The issuance of notices is therefore a serious escalation — it signals that the court is not satisfied with silence — but it is the beginning of a process, not its end.
Why contempt exists. The power to punish for contempt is not about protecting judges' dignity. It exists because court orders must mean something. If officials could ignore High Court directions with impunity, the entire system of judicial review — the citizen's ability to get the state to act lawfully — would collapse. Contempt is the enforcement mechanism behind every other right this article discusses.
If Your Relative Is Detained Abroad: A Practical Checklist
1. Contact the Pakistani mission immediately. Find the nearest Pakistani embassy or consulate in the country of detention. Give them the full name, passport number, date and place of detention (as far as known), and your contact details. Ask specifically for a consular welfare visit and invoke the Vienna Convention right to consular access.
2. File a written representation with the Foreign Ministry. Address it to the Foreign Secretary (or the relevant desk officer) in Islamabad. State the facts, attach copies of the passport and any detention-related documents, and ask the Ministry to (a) confirm the detenu's whereabouts and welfare through the mission, (b) seek consular access, and (c) facilitate legal representation. Keep proof of delivery.
3. Engage a local lawyer in the host country. Consular officers can help identify lawyers, but the family should also try to engage counsel directly in the country of detention. A local lawyer can find out the charges, attend proceedings, and challenge unlawful detention under that country's law.
4. Keep a complete file. Every letter, every email, every receipt, every response or non-response. If you later go to court in Pakistan, this file is your evidence that you exhausted the administrative route.
5. Follow up in writing, with deadlines. If there is no response within a reasonable time, send a reminder referencing your earlier representation and asking for a decision within a stated period.
6. Approach the High Court if the Ministry does not act. A writ petition under Article 199 of the Constitution can ask the High Court to direct the Foreign Ministry to process the representation and take the case up through diplomatic channels. This is exactly the route the petitioners in the UAE detentions case took — first the 14 September direction to decide the representations, and now the contempt petitions over alleged non-compliance.
7. Do not rely on social media alone. Public campaigns can raise awareness, but they do not create legal obligations. The paper trail — representations, receipts, court petitions — is what moves the machinery.
Frequently Asked Questions
Q: Can a Pakistani court order the release of a Pakistani detained in another country?
No. A Pakistani court's orders bind Pakistani authorities and persons within Pakistan's jurisdiction. They cannot directly order the authorities of the UAE — or any other sovereign state — to release anyone. What a Pakistani court can do is direct Pakistan's own executive — the Foreign Secretary, the Foreign Ministry, the mission abroad — to act: to process representations, to seek consular access, to take the matter up diplomatically, and to report back. That is what the 14 September order did, and that is what the contempt petitions seek to enforce.
Q: What exactly is consular access, and who guarantees it?
Consular access is the right of a detained foreign national to communicate with, and receive visits from, the consular officers of his home country — and the corresponding duty of the host country to inform him of this right and to allow the contact. It is guaranteed by Article 36 of the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations (1963), a treaty binding on both Pakistan and the UAE. The purpose is welfare and fairness: to make sure a foreigner in custody is not isolated, mistreated, or denied legal help.
Q: The Foreign Ministry says the matter is "under process" but nothing happens. What can I do?
"Under process" without a decision is the precise complaint in the UAE detentions case. Your remedies are: (a) keep demanding a decision in writing, with reasons, within a stated time; (b) file a representation formally so that there is a record; and (c) if the Ministry still does not decide, approach the High Court under Article 199 for a direction to the Ministry to decide the representation within a fixed timeframe — exactly as the petitioners did on 14 September. If the court gives such a direction and it is ignored, contempt proceedings are the next step.
Q: Does the Foreign Secretary face jail for ignoring the court's order?
Potentially, but that is the end of a process, not its beginning. Contempt of court can be punished with imprisonment of up to six months under the Contempt of Court Ordinance, 2003. However, the court must first be satisfied that the non-compliance was wilful and deliberate — mere delay, administrative confusion, or genuine difficulty, if properly explained, may not amount to contempt. The notices issued on 22 October give the Foreign Secretary the opportunity to explain. Only if the explanation fails does the question of punishment arise.
Q: My brother works in the Gulf and I worry about him. Is there anything I can do in advance?
Yes. Keep copies of his passport, visa, employment contract, and employer's details at home. Save the contact details of the nearest Pakistani embassy or consulate and the Foreign Ministry's consular helplines. Make sure he knows — and you know — about the right to consular access under the Vienna Convention: if he is ever detained, he should immediately ask the detaining authorities to notify the Pakistani consulate. Preparation does not prevent detention, but it shortens the time a family spends in the dark.
Q: Can the family in Pakistan get information directly from the foreign jail?
Usually not — foreign prison authorities deal with the detenu, his lawyer, and consular officers, not with relatives calling from abroad. That is precisely why consular access matters: the consulate becomes the family's eyes and ears. If the consulate is not getting access either, that is itself a matter to be raised — with the Foreign Ministry, and if necessary, with the High Court.
The Bottom Line
The Lahore High Court's notices to the Foreign Secretary on 22 October are about a simple proposition: when a court tells the executive to decide a citizen's representation, the executive must decide it. The two Pakistanis detained in the UAE — Syed Salman Raza Zaidi and Muhammad Junaid Jahangir — cannot be released by any order of a Pakistani court, because they are in another sovereign country's custody. But they are entitled, under the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations, not to be abandoned: to consular visits, to communication, to legal help, to a government that at least tries.
For the thousands of Pakistani families with relatives working in the Gulf and beyond, the case carries a practical lesson. If your relative is detained abroad, do not wait in silence: contact the mission, file a written representation with the Foreign Ministry, engage a local lawyer, keep every paper — and know that if the Ministry will not act, the High Court's writ jurisdiction is open to compel it to. Consular access is not charity. It is a right, guaranteed by a treaty Pakistan signed, and enforced — as 22 October showed — by courts that do not accept silence as an answer.