18 January 2005	Tuesday	07 Zilhaj 1425

ISLAMABAD, Jan 17: Opposition parties have notified the chairman Senate about their intention to move an adjournment motion on reported killing of 9,000 illegal Pakistani immigrants by border security forces in Greece and Turkey over the past 10 years.

The notice was moved by leader of the opposition in the Senate Raza Rabbani and Senators Sanaullah Baloch of the Balochistan National Party, Ishaq Dar of the Pakistan Muslim League-N, Dr Abdullah Riar, Enver Baig, Rukhsana Zuberi and Dr Safdar Ali Abbassi of the People's Party Parliamentarians.

Expressing concern over the report and criticizing the government, the report said that it should be discussed in the Senate. Official documents of the ministry of labour showed that Pakistan's embassy in Tripoli, Libya, had been informing the government about the problem of illegal immigrants.

The documents informed the government that the goodwill established by Pakistani manpower in Libya since the '70s was gradually being eroded because of the problem of illegal immigration of workers to Italy.

"(Some) Pakistani workers are running away from their employers, leaving behind their passports. Some of these workers are arrested while attempting to enter Italy. The Libyan government is under a lot of pressure from the European Union and the Italian government to stop this illegal immigration," said the report sent by an official of Pakistan embassy in Tripoli in July 2004.

State Minister for Overseas Pakistanis Senator Tariq Azeem said that the government would have to check the authenticity of the report about the number of deaths, adding that deaths did occur during illegal crossings of borders after people were lured by human traffickers.

He said that the government always investigated cases whenever it came to know about deaths of illegal Pakistani immigrants in any country. The minister said that the government had recently taken strict note of killing of Pakistanis in Macedonia which resulted in arrest of some senior officials there, including the minister of interior.

The minister said that accurate data about the number of illegal immigrants was unavailable as they did not use official channels to leave the country. He said that the ministry of interior had asked all port authorities to be vigilant about human smuggling, adding that action had been taken against some overseas employment promoters.