ISLAMABAD: Taking notice of putting names of two children on the Exit Control List and the resultant offloading of four members of the family of prominent lawyer Ahmad Raza Kasuri from a plane, Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan on Wednesday ordered an investigation into the matter.

The minister said the probe should be conducted to ascertain why the ECL law had been misused and names of two grandsons of Mr Kasuri included in it on the basis of a family dispute, despite clear instructions against such practice.

The authorities concerned in the ministry were directed to apologise to Mr Kasuri and return the passports of his family members besides removing the names of his grandsons from the ECL. The minister ordered suspension of the official who had placed the names of the children on the list.

Know more-Editorial: Review of the ECL

According to a spokesman for the ministry, the ECL law cannot be used in any political, personal or financial dispute.

Investigation ordered into offloading of four members of prominent lawyer’s family

The spokesman said the name of Ayyan Ali, a model facing a currency smuggling trial, had not been placed on the Exit Control List.

Under the new arrangement, he said, name of a person could be placed on the Exit Control List only on the recommendation of an investigating agency or a court of law.

The immigration authorities had on Tuesday offloaded a daughter and three grandchildren of Mr Kasuri from a Bangkok-bound flight. The children offloaded were: Fahid Tariq, 5, and Minahil, 7, and Moosa Tariq, 2. Names of Fahid Tariq and Minahil Tariq had been placed on the ECL allegedly at the request of their father.

The incident follows the interior minister’s recent statement about a new framework for placing names on the ECL. He has said that thousands of names will be removed from the list if the authorities concerned fail to provide justification for it.

The minister has regretted that certain names were there on the ECL for decades and observed that there is no justification for permanently keeping names of individuals on the list.

The new Exit Control List policy, which is likely to be announced shortly, will have a maximum timeline for which a name can be placed on the list.

Published in Dawn, July 23rd, 2015

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