How a Pakistani arms smuggler’s boat killed two US Navy Seals whose bodies were never recovered; here's his punishment

Pakistan national Muhammad Pahlawan, the captain of a fishing ship smuggling arms to Houthi rebels, was handed 40 years’ rigorous imprisonment in connection with the death of two US Navy Seals in the line of duty.

 

Muhammad Pahlawan was reportedly using his fishing vessel to hand over Iranian-made ballistic missile parts to the Houthi rebels when he was challenged by the US Navy Seals off the Somalian coast earlier this year. Chief Special Warfare Operator Christopher Chambers, 37, was tasked to board the vessel first. However, the special ops personnel slipped and fell into the sea.

 

Quickly understanding that Chambers would not be able to do much to save himself due to the weight of the equipment he was wearing during the mission, 27-year-old Special Warfare Operator 1st Class Nathan Gage Ingram voluntarily jumped into the waters to rescue him. However, neither of them made it back alive and their bodies were never recovered, the Telegraph said in a report.

 

When the rest of the Navy Seals boarded Pahlawan’s boat, they found a warhead and components of ballistic missiles and anti-ship cruise missile components on board. The components of the caches matched with those weapons routinely used by the Houthis to target Israelis, an investigation later found out. The captain was accompanied by 13 other Pakistanis he had hired to complete the arms smuggling deal after being paid £25,000 to smuggle the weapons by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), the Telegraph report said. They were all taken to the USS Lewis B. Puller by the surviving Seals before a full-fledged probe began.

 

He was handed 40 years in jail after being found guilty of terrorism offences and transporting weapons of mass destruction. While Pahlawan's handlers were identified and named in the chargesheet, they were never arrested. The duo made contact with the smugglers from the safety of Tehran, news reports said. 

 

A later probe revealed that Muhammad Pahlawan is a seasoned smuggler and had completed such weapon runs twice before for the Houthis.

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