ISLAMABAD: The Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) said on Thursday that concrete evidence was available to prove that Axact blackmailed and looted innocent people in the name of foreign academic degrees.

The agency made the claim at a meeting presided over by Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan and held to discuss the progress made in important corruption cases.

The meeting was informed that none of over 300 universities whose names had been mentioned in the Axact scam had been recognised either by the Higher Education Commission (HEC) or the relevant quarters in foreign countries.

The American authorities had formally informed FIA that 15 academic institutions of the US, in whose names degrees had been awarded online by Axact, were fake, the meeting was told.

It was further informed that data and record of over 100 terabytes were retrieved from computers at the Axact offices in the presence of a magistrate. Seventy-five per cent of data available on cloud had also been retrieved.

The FIA officials said the scam had affected thousands of Pakistanis and foreign nationals. The foreigners included British, American and Saudi nationals.

Chaudhry Nisar was also briefed on the AKD, One Constitution Avenue and Pakistan Currency Exchange cases.

Expressing satisfaction over the progress made so far by FIA, the minister directed the officials concerned to make their cases so strong that it became impossible for the culprits to avoid exemplary punishment.

He also directed the FIA officials to accelerate the pace of the ongoing campaign against human smugglers.

The minister was informed that FIA had arrested 1,245 proclaimed offenders wanted in various cases last year against 911 in 2014.

The meeting was informed that FIA had recovered Rs14.6 billion in 2014-15, Rs1.6bn in 2013, Rs210 million in 2012 and Rs200m in 2011.

The minister was informed that names of all proclaimed offenders had been placed on the Exit Control List and teams formed for their arrest.

The meeting also discussed ways of strengthening laws aimed to combat human smuggling. Chaudhry Nisar said that laws should be strengthened so that people involved in the dirty trade did not get any relief from any loophole in the law.

Published in Dawn, February 12th, 2016