Not quite true. I’ve lived here for almost 9 years now, and not long after I arrived I remember seeing a news report about the aussies smashing the pakis in a cricket game. It’s not a term that’s used much at all so it doesn’t have any racial connotations to the vast majority of the population. It wasn’t used with malice and was a genuine shortening of the name Pakistan. However the use of the word in the UK is undoubtedly racist as it’s been used in a derogatory manner for a long time and is entrenched in our culture as a racist slur. You’d have to be on a wind up, or be an idiot to think that it’s not racist.
Fair enough, though they're surely aware of what the term means in other places and would presumably think better of using it now.
Would they think it okay to call Adil Rashid or Moeed Ali a pair of Pakis?