Behind bars: FIA arrests three agents, recovers illegal passports

Initiates crackdown against such elements across Punjab

SIALKOT: A team of Federal Investigation Agency (FIA), led by senior officials on Friday raided the regional passport office in Narowal. During the raid, FIA team arrested three agents identified as Yousaf, Zaheer Ahmed and Abdul Ghafur. FIA Divisional Deputy Director Khalid Anees said, “The FIA also recovered several illegal passports, challans, tokens and data forms from the possession of the suspects.” FIA has sent the accused behind the bars after registering separate cases against them.

Previous raids

Earlier in 2016, the FIA carried out two raids and arrested three travel agents involved in human smuggling and seized 118 passports, CNICs and fake documents.



The first raid was carried out at a recruitment office located at Chandni Chowk and arrested two persons involved in human smuggling. The arrested persons were identified as Izhar Hussain and Khaliq Khan. Besides, the FIA also recovered 64 passports.

The FIA claimed the arrested travel agents used to smuggle people to Dubai and Saudi Arabia after charging them large sums of money.

In a similar crackdown by the FIA, a human smuggler was arrested from a commercial building located near Chandni Chowk. As many as 54 passports and other documents were also recovered during the raid.

Published in The Express Tribune, November 19^th, 2016.