Aafia Siddiqui (also spelled Afiya; ; born 2 March 1972) is a Pakistani neuroscientist and educator who gained international attention following her conviction in the United States and is currently serving an 86-year sentence for attempted murder and other felonies at the Federal Medical Center, Carswell, in Fort Worth, Texas.
Siddiqui was born in Pakistan to a Sunni Muslim family. and a Ph.D. in neuroscience from Brandeis University in 2001. She returned to Pakistan for a time following the 9/11 attacks and again in 2003 during the war in Afghanistan. Khalid Sheikh Mohammad named her a courier and financier for al-Qaeda, and she was placed on the Federal Bureau of Investigations's Seeking Information – Terrorism list; she was the first woman to have been featured on the list. The Islamic State have offered to trade her for prisoners on two occasions: once for James Foley and once for Kayla Mueller. Pakistani news media called the trial a "farce", She belongs to the Urdu-speaking Muhajir family, and was raised in an observant Muslim household. Her parents combined devotional Islam with their resolve to understand and use technological advances in science. Aafia attended school in Zambia until the age of eight and finished her primary and secondary schooling in Karachi.
Ismet Siddiqui was prominent in political and religious circles, teaching classes on Islam wherever she lived, founding a United Islamic Organization, and serving as a member of Pakistan's parliament. Her support for strict Islam in the face of feminist opposition to his Hudood Ordinances drew the attention of General Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq who appointed her to a Zakat Council. Her brother, Muhammad, studied to become an architect in Houston, Texas, She attended the University of Houston where friends and family described her interests as limited to religion and schoolwork. She avoided movies, novels and television, except for the news. After three semesters, she transferred to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
In 1992, as a sophomore, Siddiqui won a $5,000 Carroll L. Wilson Award for her research proposal "Islamization in Pakistan and its Effects on Women". She returned to Pakistan to interview architects of the Islamization and the Hudood Laws, including Taqi Usmani, the spiritual adviser to her family. As a junior, she received a $1,200 City Days fellowship through MIT's program to help clean up Cambridge elementary school playgrounds.
At MIT, Siddiqui lived in the all-female McCormick Hall. She remained active in charity work and proselytising. Her fellow MIT students described her as being religious, which was not unusual at the time, but not a fundamentalist, one of them saying that she was "just nice and soft-spoken". and a fellow Pakistani recalls her recruiting for association meetings and distributing pamphlets. Siddiqui began doing volunteer work for the Al Kifah Refugee Center after returning from Pakistan. Al Kifah included members who assassinated Jewish ultranationalist Meir Kahane and helped Ramzi Yousef with the 1993 World Trade Center bombing. She was known for her effectiveness in shaming audiences into contributing to jihad and the only woman known to have regularly raised money for Al-Kifah. Through the student association she met several committed Islamists, including Suheil Laher, its imam, who had publicly advocated Islamization and jihad before 9/11. an outraged Siddiqui circulated the announcement with a scornful note deriding Pakistan for "officially" joining "the typical gang of our contemporary Muslim governments", closing her email with a quote from the Quran warning Muslims not to take Jews and Christians as friends. She wrote three guides for teaching Islam, expressing the hope in one: "that our humble effort continues... and more and more people come to the [religion] of Allah until America becomes a Muslim land." mailed US military manuals to Pakistan and moved from her apartment after the FBI agents visited the university looking for her.
Marriage, graduate school, and work
In 1995, she agreed to a marriage arranged by her mother to Karachi-born anesthesiologist Amjad Mohammed Khan just out of medical school and whom she had never seen. In early 1999, while she was a graduate student, she taught the General Biology Laboratory course. She co-authored a journal article on selective learning that was published in 2003. One incident that caused controversy was her presentation of a paper on fetal alcohol syndrome where she concluded that science showed why God had forbidden alcohol in the Quran. When told by some teachers this was inappropriate, she complained bitterly of discrimination to the associate dean of graduate studies, threatening to "open a can of worms".
After receiving her PhD, she told one of her advisers she planned to devote herself to her family over her career. She began translating biographies of Arab Afghan shahid (jihad fighters who had been killed) written by Abdullah Yusuf Azzam ("the Godfather of Afghan Jihad"). and became more strict in her religion, wearing a niqāb—a black veil that covered everything but her eyes—and avoiding any music—even background music at science exhibits.
In 1999, while living in Boston, Siddiqui founded the Institute of Islamic Research and Teaching as a nonprofit organization. She was the organization's president, her husband treasurer, and her sister resident agent. She also co-founded the Dawa Resource Center, which offered faith-based services to prison inmates.
Divorce, al-Qaeda allegations, and remarriage
Tensions began to arise in her marriage, which, according to Siddiqui's then-husband Khan, was caused by her overwhelming devotion to activism and jihad. Khan went to Siddiqui's parents' home, announced his intention to divorce her, and argued with her father. According to her statements to the FBI, it was at this point that her connections with Al-Qaeda began in earnest.
In February 2003, Siddiqui married Ammar al-Baluchi, an accused al-Qaeda member and a nephew of al-Qaeda leader Khalid Sheikh Mohammed (KSM), in Karachi. While her family denies she married al-Baluchi, Pakistani and US intelligence sources, a psychologist for the defense during her 2009 trial, and Khalid Sheikh Mohammed's family all confirm that the marriage took place. The marriage lasted only a couple of months. According to one of KSM's uncles, Mohammed Hussein, al-Baluchi became alienated with Siddiqui's "liberal way of life." Siddiqui told the FBI that al-Baluchi divorced her after he was arrested.
Alleged conspiring with KSM
Siddiqui left for the US on 25 December 2002, informing her ex-husband Amjad Mohammed Khan that she was looking for a job;
According to the US government, Majid Khan was an operative for an Al-Qaeda cell led by Khalid Sheikh Mohammad which planned to attack targets in the US, in the UK (at Heathrow Airport), and inside Pakistan. In the US, C-4 plastic explosives and other chemicals would be smuggled in under the cover of textile exports – 20 and 40 ft foot containers filled with women's and children's clothes.
According to the US government, Siddiqui's role was to "rent houses and provide administrative support for the operation". When she returned from Pakistan to the US in January 2003, it was, according to the charge, to help renew the American travel papers of Majid Khan, who would execute the bombing. In his testimony, Majid Khan stated that he provided Siddiqui with money, photos, and a completed application for an "asylum travel form" that "looked and functioned like a passport". He also testified that back in the US Siddiqui "opened a post office box in detainee's name, using her driver's licence information". The diamonds were purchased because they were untraceable assets to be used for funding al-Qaeda operations. The identification of Siddiqui was made three years after the incident by one of the go-betweens in the Liberian deal. Alan White, former chief investigator of the UN-backed war crimes tribunal in Liberia, said she was the woman. Siddiqui's lawyer maintained credit card receipts and other records showed that she was in Boston at the time. after his arrest on 1 March 2003. His "confessions" – obtained while being tortured – triggered a series of related arrests shortly thereafter
FBI agent Dennis Lormel, who investigated terrorism financing, said the agency ruled out a specific claim that she had evaluated diamond operations in Liberia though she remained suspected of money laundering. On 26 May 2004, US Attorney General John Ashcroft held a press conference described her as among the seven "most wanted" al-Qaeda fugitives and a "clear and present danger to the US".
One day before the announcement, however, The New York Times cited the US Department of Homeland Security saying there were no current risks; American Democrats accused the Bush administration of attempting to divert attention from plummeting poll numbers and to push the failings of the Invasion of Iraq off the front pages.
After her 2008 reappearance and arrest, Siddiqui told the FBI that she had at first gone into hiding with KSM's al-Baluchi clan (her lawyer later repudiated that statement) and worked at the Karachi Institute of Technology in 2005, was in Afghanistan in 2007, and also spent time in Quetta, Pakistan, sheltered by various people. She told the FBI she met with Mufti Abu Lubaba Shah Mansoor, and according to the FBI, had begun collecting materials on viruses for biological warfare. According to an intelligence official in the Afghan Ministry of the Interior, her son, Ahmed, who was with her when she was arrested, said he and Siddiqui had worked in an office in Pakistan collecting money for poor people. During her disappearance, Khan said he saw her at Islamabad airport in April 2003 as she disembarked from a flight with their son; he said he helped Inter-Services Intelligence identify her. He said he again saw her two years later, in a Karachi traffic jam. Investigating the disappearance, US journalist Deborah Scroggins reported that Geo TV presenter Hamid Mir informed her that friends of Siddiqui believed she had gone underground avoiding the FBI. Scroggins was also warned by Pakistanis with jihadist connections, including Khalid Khawaja, that she might end up like Daniel Pearl (who was beheaded) if she attempted to find Siddiqui.
Ahmed and Siddiqui reappeared in 2008.
Alleged kidnapping
When Siddiqui's ex-mother-in-law and ex-father-in-law filed a custody suit against the Siddiqui family in an attempt to see their grandchildren (the Siddiqui family refused to talk to them), Siddiqui's mother claimed under oath the FBI and US Justice Department officials had informed her that "the minors are with the mother and are in safe condition", the opposite of what such officials had told her American lawyer in May of that year. Siddiqui's sister and mother denied that she had any connections to al-Qaeda and claimed that the US held her secretly in Afghanistan. They pointed to comments by former Bagram Air Base, Afghanistan, detainees who say Siddiqui had been at the prison while they were there.
According to journalist, Muslim convert, and former Taliban captive Yvonne Ridley, Siddiqui spent those years in solitary confinement at Bagram as "Prisoner 650". Six human rights groups, including Amnesty International, listed her as a possible ghost prisoner held by the US. S.H. Faruqi, Siddiqui's uncle, reported that Siddiqui visited him in January 2008, telling him she had been imprisoned and tortured at Bagram Airfield for several years and released to serve as a double agent infiltrating extremist groups. Siddiqui herself later claimed that she had been kidnapped by US intelligence and Pakistani intelligence. He said that they had been seen in her sister's house in Karachi and in Islamabad since 2003.
In April 2010, Aafia's daughter, Mariam, was found outside the family home wearing a collar with the address of the family home. She was said to be speaking English. A Pakistani ministry official said the girl was believed to have been held captive in Afghanistan from 2003 to 2010.
The US government said it had not held Siddiqui during that time frame and was unaware of her location from March 2003 until July 2008. The mass of secret U.S. cables released in 2010 by Wikileaks included memos by the US Embassy in Islamabad Pakistan asking other United States government departments whether Aafia had been in secret custody. One stated: "Bagram officials have assured us that they have not been holding Siddiqui for the last four years, as has been alleged."
The US ambassador to Pakistan, Anne W. Patterson, stated that Siddiqui had not been in US custody "at any time" prior to July 2008. According to some U.S. officials, she went underground after the FBI alert for her was issued and was at large working on behalf of al-Qaeda. The Boston Globe also mentioned one document about a "theoretical" biological weapon that did not harm children. Other notes described various ways to attack enemies, including by destroying reconnaissance drones, using underwater bombs, and using gliders. and about two pounds of sodium cyanide, a highly toxic poison. US prosecutors later said that sodium cyanide is lethal even when ingested in small doses, and various of the other chemicals she had could be used in explosives. Abdul Ghani, Ghazni's deputy police chief, said she later confessed she had planned a suicide attack against the governor of Ghazni Province. "I could see the barrel of the rifle, the inner portion of the barrel of the weapon; that indicated to me that it was pointed straight at my head," he said. At that point, the warrant officer returned fire with a 9-millimeter pistol, hitting her in the torso, and one of the interpreters disarmed her.
Hospital treatment and evaluation
Siddiqui was taken to U.S. military base Bagram Airfield in Afghanistan by helicopter in critical condition. She later told visiting Pakistani her statements might not look good to the Pakistani public but she had made them because her children had been threatened.
Criminal complaint and trial
In pretrial activity, defense attorney Elaine Sharp said that the documents and item found on Siddiqui were planted. A government terrorism expert disagreed, stating there were "hundred of pages in her own handwriting". In Pakistan, Siddiqui's sister Fowzia accused the US of raping and torturing her sister and denying her medical treatment. The Pakistan National Assembly passed a unanimous resolution calling for Siddiqui's repatriation.
Prior to her trial, Siddiqui said she was innocent of all charges. She maintained she could prove she was innocent but refused to do so in court. On 11 January 2010, Siddiqui told the judge that she would not co-operate with her attorneys and wanted to fire them. She said she did not trust the judge and added, "I'm boycotting the trial, just to let all of you know. There's too many injustices." She then put her head down on the defence table as the prosecution proceeded.
Explaining why the US may have chosen to charge her as they did rather than for her alleged terrorism, Bruce Hoffman, professor of security studies at Georgetown University, said: "There's no intelligence data that needs to be introduced, no sources and methods that need to be risked. It's a good old-fashioned crime; it's the equivalent of a 1920s gangster with a tommy gun."
Defense lawyer Sharp expressed skepticism regarding both the terrorism and assault charges: "I think it's interesting that they make all these allegations about the dirty bombs and other items she supposedly had, but they haven't charged her with anything relating to terrorism... I would urge people to consider her as innocent unless the government proves otherwise."
Extradition and arraignment
On 4 August 2008, Siddiqui was placed on an FBI jet and flown to New York City She refused to appear for her arraignment or attend a hearing in September or meet with visitors. Siddiqui made her first appearance before a judge in a Manhattan courtroom on 6 August 2008 following which she was remanded into custody.
Medical treatment and psychological assessments
On 11 August, after her counsel maintained that Siddiqui had not seen a doctor since arriving in the US the previous week, US Magistrate Judge Henry B. Pitman ordered that she be examined by a medical doctor within 24 hours. Prosecutors maintained that Siddiqui had received adequate medical care for her gunshot wound but could not confirm whether she had been seen by a doctor or paramedic. The judge postponed her bail hearing until 3 September. An examination by a doctor the following day found no visible signs of infection; she also received a CAT scan.
Siddiqui was provided care for her wound while incarcerated in the United States. A psychiatrist employed by the prosecutor to examine Siddiqui's competence to stand trial, Gregory B. Saathoff, observed in a March 2009 report that Siddiqui frequently verbally and physically refused to allow the medical staff to check her vital signs and weight, attempted to refuse medical care once it was apparent that her wound had largely healed, and refused to take antibiotics. Leslie Powers initially determined Siddiqui mentally unfit to stand trial. After reviewing portions of FBI reports, however, she told the pre-trial judge she believed Siddiqui was faking mental illness. In regard to her comments, Siddiqui's legal team stated that her incarceration had damaged her mind.She later claimed she was not against all "Israeli Americans".
Trial proceedings
After 18 months of detention, Siddiqui's trial began in New York City on 19 January 2010. Prior to the jury entering the courtroom, Siddiqui told onlookers that she would not work with her lawyers because the trial was a sham. She also said: "I have information about attacks, more than 9/11!... I want to help the President to end this group, to finish them... They are a domestic, U.S. group; they are not Muslim."
Nine government witnesses were called by the prosecution. Army Captain Robert Snyder, John Threadcraft, a former army officer, and FBI agent John Jefferson testified first. The court also heard from FBI agent John Jefferson and Ahmed Gul, an army interpreter, who recounted their struggle with her. The judge disallowed as evidence her possession of chemicals and terror manuals and her alleged ties to al-Qaeda because they could have created an inappropriate bias.
Her defence argued that there was no forensic evidence that the rifle was fired in the interrogation room. The prosecution argued that it was not unusual to fail to get fingerprints off a gun. "This is a crime that was committed in a war zone, a chaotic and uncontrolled environment 6,000 miles away from here."
Siddiqui insisted on testifying at the trial against the advice of her lawyers. According to at least one source (Deborah Scroggins), Siddiqui "avoided the question of where she had been for the last five years" and her replies under cross examination may have damaged her credibility in jurists' eyes. In answer to prosecutor's questions, she stated that the documents in her bag on terror plans and weapons had been given to her, and that she did not know that the boy who was with her in Ghazni was her son. When it was pointed out that the documents in her bag were in her own handwriting, she stated "in a vague and halting manner" that she had been forced to copy them out of a magazine so that her children would not be tortured. When questioned about taking a firearms course, she stated that "everyone used to take it". The pistol safety instructor then testified that he remembered teaching her how to fire "hundreds of rounds". In his closing arguments, the prosecutor told the jury that Siddiqui had "raised her right hand" and "lied to your face".
During the trial, Siddiqui was removed from the court several times for repeatedly interrupting the proceedings with shouting; on being ejected, she was told by the judge that she could watch the proceedings on closed-circuit television in an adjacent holding cell. A request by the defence lawyers to declare a mistrial was turned down by the judge. Amnesty International monitored the trial for fairness.
Conviction
thumb|[[Metropolitan Detention Center, Brooklyn, where Siddiqui was formerly imprisoned before transferring in 2010]]
The trial lasted 14 days with the jury deliberating for three days before reaching a verdict. On 3 February 2010, Siddiqui was found guilty of two counts of attempted murder, armed assault, using and carrying a firearm, and three counts of assault on U.S. officers and employees.
She faced a minimum sentence of 30 years and a maximum of life in prison on the firearm charge, and could also have received a sentence of up to 20 years for each attempted murder and armed assault charge, and up to 8 years on each of the remaining assault counts. Her lawyers also claimed her mental illness was on display during her trial outbursts and boycotts, and that she was "first and foremost" the victim of her own irrational behaviour. The sentencing hearing set to take place on 6 May 2010 and then September 2010.
A reporter for The New York Times wrote that at times during the hearing Judge Berman seemed to be speaking to an audience beyond the courtroom in an apparent attempt to address widespread speculation about Siddiqui and her case. He gave as an example a reference to the five-year period before her 2008 arrest of Siddiqui's disappearance and claims of torture, where the judge said: "I am aware of no evidence in the record to substantiate these allegations or to establish them as fact. There is no credible evidence in the record that the United States officials and/or agencies detained Dr. Siddiqui". In sentencing her, Berman repeated the prosecution witnesses' claim that while she shot at Americans with an M-4 rifle she had said "I want to kill Americans" and "Death to America". Siddiqui said she forgave the soldier who had shot her, as well as the judge. She told the court: "I am a Muslim, but I do love America, too. I do not want any bloodshed. I really want to make peace and end the wars."
At the time of sentencing, Siddiqui did not show any interest in filing an appeal, instead saying "I appeal to God and he hears me." After she was sentenced, she urged forgiveness and asked the public not to take any action in retaliation. She stated, "forgive everybody in my case, please... Don't get angry. If I'm not angry, why should anyone else be?" In a notably gracious exchange between the bestower and recipient of an 80+ year sentence of incarceration, the judge wished her "the very best going forward", and both Siddiqui and the judge thanked each other.
Imprisonment
Siddiqui (Federal Bureau of Prisons #90279-054) was originally held at Metropolitan Detention Center, Brooklyn. She is now being held in Federal Medical Center, Carswell in Fort Worth, Texas, a federal prison for female inmates with special mental health needs, and also relatively close to the home of her brother Ali Siddiqui. Her release date is 30 June 2082.
Children
According to Arab News, Pakistan's president, Asif Ali Zardari, had personally requested Afghanistan's president Hamid Karzai return Siddiqui's children to their family in Pakistan. In the summer of 2008 Aafia and a teenage boy were reported to have been apprehended by Afghan police. It was later confirmed that the teenage boy was her eldest son. On 26 August 2008, the United States Department of State confirmed that the youth captured with Aafia Siddiqui on 17 July 2008 was her son, American citizen Ahmed Siddiqui. Ahmed was transferred to the custody of Pakistani security officials. Joanne Mariner, then Director of the Terrorism and Counterterrorism Program at Human Rights Watch, criticized Afghanistan officials for transferring Ahmed to the National Directorate of Security due to its reputation for using torture as an interrogation tool. Mariner pointed out that under Afghan law Ahmed was too young to be held criminally responsible. Ahmed was released from Afghanistan to his aunt in Pakistan following enormous outcry from the Pakistani public and politicians. While Pakistani law would normally give his father custody, his father did not want to fight the passionate public opinion supporting his aunt Fowzia. , he was living with his aunt in Karachi; Fowzia prohibited him from talking to the press at that time.
She reported that the statement was taken from Ahmed by an American official when he was released. The statement is the first from Ahmed. His aunt Fowzia expressed doubt that the girl was her niece Maryam. In April 2010, Pakistan Interior Minister Rehman Malik claimed a 12-year-old girl found outside a house in Karachi was identified by DNA as Siddiqui's daughter, Mariyam, and that she had been returned to her family. The 2010 Times Square car bombing attempt occurred one day after Mehsud released another video promising to avenge Siddiqui. The perpetrator of the attempt was Faisal Shahzad, a recently naturalized Pakistan-born citizen who had contacts with Jaish-e-Muhammad and Hakimullah Mehsud.
According to a February 2010 report in the Pakistani newspaper The News International, the Taliban threatened to execute US soldier Bowe Bergdahl, whom they had captured on 30 June 2009 in retaliation for Siddiqui's conviction. A Taliban spokesperson claimed that members of Siddiqui's family had requested help from the Taliban to obtain her release from prison in the US. Bergdahl was released on 31 May 2014 in exchange for five Guantanamo Bay detainees.
In September 2010, the Taliban kidnapped Linda Norgrove, a Scottish aid worker in Afghanistan, and Taliban commanders insisted Norgrove would be handed over only in exchange for Siddiqui. On 8 October 2010, Norgrove was accidentally killed during a rescue attempt by a grenade thrown by one of her rescuers.
In July 2011, then-deputy of the Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan, Waliur Rehman, announced that they wanted to swap Siddiqui for two Swiss citizens abducted in Balochistan. The Swiss couple escaped in March 2012.
In December 2011, al-Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri demanded the release of Siddiqui in exchange for Warren Weinstein, an American aid worker kidnapped in Pakistan on 13 August 2011. Weinstein was accidentally killed in a drone strike in January 2015.
In January 2013, al-Qaeda-linked terrorists involved in the Algerian In Amenas hostage crisis listed the release of Siddiqui as one of their demands.
In June 2013, the captors of two Czech women kidnapped in Pakistan demanded the release of Siddiqui in exchange for the two captives. Both Czech women were released in March 2015, following intense negotiations by a Turkish NGO IHH.
In August 2014, it was reported that the terrorist who claimed responsibility for the beheading of U.S. photojournalist James Foley mentioned Siddiqui in an email to Foley's family. Siddiqui was identified in the email as one of the Muslim "sisters" the Islamic State was purportedly willing to swap as part of a prisoner exchange with the United States.
In February 2015, Paul Gosar said the family of Kayla Mueller had been told plans to swap her for Siddiqui were underway in the months before her death. ISIS had also demanded $6.6 million in exchange for Mueller.
In March 2017, Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula leader Qasim al-Raymi said that his group demanded the release of Siddiqui in exchange for Luke Somers, an American journalist kidnapped in Yemen in September 2013. Somers was killed during a rescue attempt in December 2014.
In January 2022, a man claiming to be Siddiqui's brother took hostages at the Beth Israel synagogue in Colleyville, Texas, near where she is imprisoned, and demanded her release. He was later shot and killed by police, and the hostages were rescued.
Pakistan
Her case has been called a "flashpoint of Pakistani-American tensions", and "one of the most mysterious in a secret war dense with mysteries". The case was covered very differently in Pakistan than in the United States.
After Siddiqui's conviction, she sent a message through her lawyer, saying that she does not want "violent protests or violent reprisals in Pakistan over this verdict." Her sister, Fowzia, has spoken frequently and passionately on her behalf at rallies. Echoing her family's comments and anti-US sentiment, many believe she was detained in Karachi in 2003, held at the US Bagram Airbase and tortured, and that the charges against her were fabricated.
Her conviction was followed with expressions of support by many Pakistanis, who appeared increasingly anti-American, as well as by politicians and the news media, who characterised her as a symbol of victimisation by the United States. Graffiti "Free Dr. Aafia" appeared "even in remote areas" of the country.
The Pakistani Embassy in Washington, D.C., expressed its dismay over the verdict, which followed "intense diplomatic and legal efforts on her behalf. [We] will consult the family of Dr. Aafia Siddiqui and the team of defence lawyers to determine the future course of action." Prime Minister Gilani described Siddiqui as a "daughter of the nation," and opposition leader Nawaz Sharif promised to push for her release. Shakil Chaudhry lamented the "mass hysteria" of supporters. But when one columnist (Mubashir Lucman) raised questions about Aafia's sister Fowzia's account, graffiti "appeared all over Karachi insulting" him.
U.S. observers noted the Pakistani reaction. Jessica Eve Stern, a terrorism specialist and lecturer at Harvard Law School, observed: "Whatever the truth is, this case is of great political importance because of how people [in Pakistan] view her." The Pakistani government paid $2 million for the services of three lawyers to assist in the defense of Siddiqui during her trial. Many Siddiqui supporters were present during the proceedings, and outside the court dozens of people rallied to demand her release.
In February 2010, President Asif Ali Zardari requested of Richard Holbrooke, US Special Envoy to Afghanistan and Pakistan, that the US consider repatriating Siddiqui to Pakistan under the Pakistan-US Prisoner Exchange Agreement. On 22 February, the Pakistani Senate urged the government to work towards her immediate release.
In September 2010, Pakistan Interior Minister Rehman Malik sent a letter to the United States Attorney General calling for repatriation of Siddiqui to Pakistan. He said that the case of Siddiqui had become a matter of public concern in Pakistan and her repatriation would create goodwill for the US.
In July 2019, after meeting with United States President Donald Trump, Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan told the media that releasing Shakeel Afridi in exchange for Siddiqui was a possibility.
On 6 July 2024, the Islamabad High Court ruled that the government must create a plan to repatriate Siddiqui by 26 August. On 2 November, Attorney General of Pakistan Mansoor Usman Awan informed the Islamabad High Court that a Pakistani delegation is scheduled to visit the United States following the presidential elections to negotiate the release of Siddiqui.
On 17 September 2024, Siddiqui's lawyers filed a clemency petition with President Joe Biden, seeking her release, or her exchange for Dr. Shakeel Afridi. The petition runs to 56,600 words, canvassing the whole history of her case. Her lawyers also filed an extensive analysis of her prison record, reflecting the failure by the Bureau of Prisons to provide her with basic medical care, as well as the various punishments imposed upon her for claiming to be the victim of rape – punishments that her lawyers claim were imposed on a whistleblower in violation of the Prison Rape Elimination Act (PREA).
On 11 July 2025, the Islamabad High Court (IHC) issued a warning to the federal government, including Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif and cabinet members, over repeated non-compliance in the Siddiqui case. Justice Sardar Ejaz Ishaq Khan, presiding over a petition filed by Fouzia Siddiqui, expressed serious displeasure at the government's failure to submit a report explaining its refusal to assist in legal proceedings related to Dr. Siddiqui’s case in the United States. The court questioned why contempt proceedings should not be initiated against the entire cabinet, including the Prime Minister.
On 21 July 2025, the court proceeded with the issuance of contempt notices to Shehbaz and the members of his cabinet for failing to submit a response in Siddiqui's case. All members of the federal government were made respondents in the contempt petition, with the replies of all the ministers, including Shehbaz, being sought within two weeks.