17 October 2004	Sunday	02 Ramazan 1425

ISLAMABAD, Oct 16: Three Afghan nationals, who sought political asylum in Britain after travelling on fake documents, had paid Rs2.2 million for the documents, a source told Dawn.

Saima Khan, Sher Shah and Sher Afgan had reached London from Islamabad on Pakistan International Airlines flight PK-785 on September 29. On reaching London, they destroyed their documents and sought political asylum.

The source said the Afghan family allegedly paid Rs1.8 million to the assistant director supervisory (Immigration) and a head constable for helping them board the PIA aircraft at Islamabad airport. The head constable was present at the FIA immigration check-in counter from where the Afghan nationals were cleared.

According to the immigration record, the passengers were cleared at the check-in counter in a very short span of time at 9:52am, 9:56am and 9:58am, respectively.

The human smuggler, who had come to see off the Afghan passengers at the airport, had been identified as Mustafa Bilal.

The source said Jahanzeb, a resident of Peshawar, had arranged fake travel documents for the Afghan family against payment of Rs400,000. Later, Jahanzeb also introduced the Afghan family to the assistant director with the help of an employee of a private airline.

The source said the assistant director had also made an attempt to board the family on a Kuwait Airways flight, but could not do so due to certain objections raised by the airlines staff at the check-in counter.

He said after some days, the assistant director succeeded in getting the passengers boarded on the PIA flight. A PIA employee issued the boarding passes to the passengers. There was no other flight scheduled to take off from the airport when the PIA staff was busy in check-in of London-bound passengers.

The source said the accused persons including the two immigration officials would be arrested soon after fulfilling of legal requirements.