PRAGUE (AFP) – A Czech model condemned to more than eight years in jail for drug trafficking in Pakistan in 2019 was released on Saturday following her acquittal earlier this month, according to the Czech foreign ministry.
Tereza Hluskova, 25, was detained in January 2018 at the airport in the eastern Pakistani city of Lahore for trafficking nine kilogrammes of heroin.
Authorities discovered cocaine packed in her bag as she attempted to board an aircraft bound for the United Arab Emirates, according to video provided by Pakistani customs officials.
Hluskova, who claimed the narcotics were placed in her bag by someone else, was sentenced to eight years and eight months in jail and fined in March 2019.
According to her lawyer Saif ul Malook, a court of appeals freed her on November 1 because “the prosecution failed to prove its case beyond a reasonable doubt.”
Czech Foreign Minister Jakub Kulhanek tweeted, “The Czech citizen was freed from prison in Pakistan today.”
“Our embassy will now assist her in arranging a return journey to the Czech Republic,” he continued.
Despite a decade of costly US and international counter-narcotics programmes, Pakistan shares a long porous border with Afghanistan, which is the world’s largest illegal opium grower.
In Pakistan, drug trafficking is a severe crime, and arrests at airports are not uncommon.
The South Asian country is a stop on the drug-smuggling routes that go from Afghanistan to Central Asia, Europe, and North America.
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