GUJRAT: Police claimed to have repatriated from Azerbaijan through Interpol a suspect wanted in a murder case 15 years ago.

Reports said suspect Sher Afghan of Laal Warri village had shot dead a man in 2011 and later fled the country.

An official of Gujrat police said DPO Faisal Shahzad had tasked Saddar Gujrat Station House Officer Sub Inspector Raja Shehroz to get the suspect repatriated from abroad upon which the process was initiated.

The suspect is now in the custody of Gujrat police.

Meanwhile Gujrat police also claimed to have traced and arrested the suspects involved in the blind murder of a fruit kiosk owner as he was killed in an honour-related issue near Saroki bridge along Sargodha Road around a couple of months ago.

The suspects also include a married woman with whom the deceased had allegedly tried to develop relations.

A police spokesman said Muhamad Saleem had lodged a complaint with the industrial estate area 2 police station on Aug 1 last stating that his brother Mazhar Iqbal had a fruit kiosk at Saroki canal bridge stop. He said an unidentified biker came to make a deal for purchasing fruits for an event. However, the suspect later shot his brother dead and fled.

Police registered a case against unidentified suspects and started an investigation.

The police later traced and arrested suspect Falak Sher who revealed that his friend Ahmed who was settled in Saudi Arabia, had approached him that a man, Mazhar, had been trying to develop relations with his wife and asked the suspect to kill him.

As a result the suspect orchestrated the murder.

The spokesman said that a process had been initiated to get the suspect repatriated from Saudi Arabia.

ARRESTED: The Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) claimed to have arrested 21 suspects involved in human trafficking and fraud cases during a crackdown across the Gujranwala region.

A Gujranwala FIA spokesperson said that the arrested suspects had been involved in financial scams of over Rs13 million. He said the arrested suspects included five proclaimed offenders and a deportee from Libya. The Gujranwala FIA circle had arrested 11 suspects while eight were arrested by the Gujrat and two by Sialkot circles.

He said that as per initial investigations, the arrested suspects had committed to send their clients to Italy, Greece, Spain, Germany as well as Turkiye, Canada, Saudi Arabia and Cambodia, but they neither fulfilled their commitment nor returned the money.

He said the Gujrat FIA circle also arrested one Tauqeer Hussain for changing his father’s name on the national identity card, whereas a deportee from Libya namely Rameez Ali had also been arrested. Another proclaimed offender, namely Kashif Naseer, was arrested for preparing fake documents for Turkish visit visas, he added.

The spokesperson said that the action against human trafficking networks would continue in the region.

Published in Dawn, October 1st, 2026