Sharbat Gula suffering from Hepatitis C, court told

Gula, 46, has been charged for living in the country on fraudulent documents

ISLAMABAD: The lawyer of Sharbat Gula- NatGeo's famed green-eyed ‘Afghan girl’, told a Peshawar court on Tuesday that her client was fighting Hepatitis C.

Peshawar High Court deferred for one day the hearing of the case of Gula, who was arrested for living in the country with fraudulent identity papers.

Gula, 46, has been charged for fraudulently attaining a Pakistani ID card, allegations she has strongly denied. Gula rose to famous after a photograph of her appeared on a 1985 cover of National Geographic.



Afghan ambassador in Islamabad Omar Zakhilwal told The Express Tribune that the hearing “went very well” and that the judge deferred the order to tomorrow to read all the documents.

In his earlier statements, Zakhilwal was confident Gula would be freed on Tuesday after diplomats met and assured her that she would be acquitted.

Following Tuesday's hearing he said, “This is understandable and we therefore are patient," adding that “Sharbat Gula is provided with a better separate facility and food and is treated very well."

Gula, also dubbed the ‘Afghan Mona Lisa’ was arrested on October 26 from her residence in an old neighbourhood of Peshawar by a special team of the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) on account of living in the country  forged identity papers.



Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan on Sunday said he had urged the FIA to facilitate the Afghan woman's release on humanitarian grounds.

Afghans say Gula belonged to Pachir Aw Agam district in eastern Nangarhar province, bordering Pakistan. At the age of six, she had lost her father and mother, in a bombing by the Soviet fighter jets during the USSR’s occupation of Afghanistan.

She had migrated to Pakistan along with her brother, three sisters and grandmother where she married Rehmat Gul, a baker near Peshawar in 1990. Together they have three daughters – Rubina, Zahida and Aalia.



The Afghan ambassador on Friday insisted that it is not only Gula who is accused of having a fake Pakistani identity cards but there are an estimated over 0.5 million Afghan refugees to whom the National Database Registration Authority (NADRA) has issued Pakistani IDs.

“[This has happened] as per its process of which the Ministry of Interior is very well aware,” he said.