Journalist Ben Sixsmith wrote that the reason this story is only now blowing up despite being more than a decade old is because of the institutional actors involved downplaying the extent of the crimes and making sure the story got as little traction as possible.

He called it a “conspiracy of murmuring.”

“The establishment—that is, the organs of the state, the traditional media, and the web of charities and [nongovernmental organizations] that some of us have called ‘the Blob’—have addressed the scandal in the most minimal terms,” Sixsmith wrote. “ … Overall the issue has been obscured—not swept under the rug, no, but placed neatly in a drawer.”

Sixsmith further noted that the criminals faced minimal consequences, officials even less, and that there was generally a denial that there was any kind of larger issue in the Pakistani community.