KARACHI: The Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) on Friday offloaded 23 passengers traveling to Malaysia on visit visas with the aim of taking up “illegal” jobs and planning to disappear there.

They were prevented from traveling abroad at Karachi’s Jinnah International Airport, as they had neither submitted the mandatory bank statements required for a visit visa nor had sufficient funds, according to a statement issued by the FIA.

Over the past few months, numerous incidents have been reported of travelers being offloaded from flights at various airports, despite possessing valid travel documents. These actions followed a crackdown on migrant smuggling launched after the 2024 Greece boat tragedy, which claimed several Pakistani lives.

The initial probe revealed that Malaysia-bound passengers, who were from Karachi, Lower Dir, Mardan, Swat, Bajaur, Bannu, Peshawar, and Gujrat, were in contact with agents. They “confessed” that they were traveling to take up illegal jobs in Malaysia.

Further investigation during immigration profiling revealed that the passengers, who were traveling with an agent, Mohammad Awais, neither had sufficient cash nor could they provide the required money for obtaining a visa.

Awais revealed that visit visas were arranged by Waseem Khan with the help of another agent, Stephen, and the payment was made through bank accounts.

The FIA then handed the passengers to the agency’s anti-human trafficking circle for further investigation.

On Thursday, the Lahore High Court (LHC) issued a stern reminder to the FIA and other authorities concerned, saying that any person offloaded or restrained from travelling must be provided with written reasons at the time of the action being taken.

So far, this year 51,000 passengers have been offloaded at Pakistani airports after failing immigration checks, with a large number of them being offloaded at Lahore and Karachi airports.