LAHORE: The Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) has booked its own eight officials for allegedly abetting human smuggling by air travel as a foreign airlines’ officials are also involved in it.

In Pakistan, human traffickers usually opt for a land route to transport illegal immigrants to ‘greener pastures’ but in this case air route was exploited to send two illegal immigrants to Italy and Canada through doctored travel documents.

The FIA booked its sub-inspectors Sulyman Liaqat and lmran Shoukat, ASI Sajjad Ahmed, traffic assistants Asif Masood and Osma Aslam, and constables Nadeem Mustafa, Danish Ali and Faisal Nazir posted at Sialkot International Airport for their alleged offence. All suspects are reportedly on pre-arrest bail.

According to the first information report, a suspect departed from Sialkot airport to Italy via Doha on forged travel documents of Muhammad Irfan by changing the picture. The passenger was issued double boarding. The MRP verification showed that the passenger with possession of passport was not the rightful owner and the picture on the passport was changed. Later, the same passenger was deported by the Doha immigration authorities and on arrival his papers were processed without MRP verification. The original passport holder, Muhammad Irfan, had already departed for Italy.

In another incident, suspect Arslan Aslam departed from Sialkot airport to Canada via Doha on forged travel documents of Umer Raza by changing the picture.

The MRP verification showed that the passenger with possession of passport was not the rightful owner and the picture on it was changed. The original passport holder, Umer Raza, had already departed for Canada from Allama Iqbal International Airport, Lahore.

Later on, the passenger was deported by the Doha immigration authorities and on arrival at the Sialkot airport his documents were processed.

The FIA inquiry has found the above suspects of facilitating the departure of [imposter] passengers on forged documents. “All the above alleged immigration and (foreign) airlines officials have committed the offence of criminal misconduct by misuse of authority by facilitating the imposter passengers on departure and arrival,” the inquiry reports says.

The FIA has also booked passport holders - Muhammad Irfan and Umar Raza - and suspect Arslan Aslam and unknown imposter under sections 17/18 E.0 1979, 201, 419, 420, 468. 471 PPC, r/w 5 (2) 47 PCA while the role of others agents, FIA officers/officials and airline/SIAL officials will be determined during the course of investigation.

Recently, notorious human smugglers have started taking advantage of Pakistani immigrants trying to illegally reach Europe via Iran by holding them for ransom.

The smugglers in Pakistan with the help of their sub-agents detain and torture immigrants aspiring to reach Europe, film the ordeal, and send it back to their respective families to seek money for the safe release of their loved ones.

A few months ago three such incidents were reported in which as many as 10 young men were tortured and incarcerated by these gangs. A few of them paid money to secure freedom while some were released by the Iran police in collaboration with the Pakistani embassy in Tehran.

According to the FIA, the dangerous trend of arranging the travel of illegal immigrants and detaining them abroad to extract heavy amounts — by local gangs in cohort with their international counterparts — has picked up steam in recent times.

Published in Dawn, October 20th, 2024