“Under the jail law, the family can meet their members in jail with a gap of 15 days,” said the counsel. PHOTO: AFP
Afridi has been languishing in prison for more than five years after his fake vaccination programme helped the CIA track and kill the al Qaeda leader.
His lawyer Qamar Nadim told AFP on Wednesday that officials are refusing to renew Afridi’s wife’s ID card, which expired in December, because her husband’s card had lapsed in 2014. He has also been denied a new card.
Officials are similarly refusing to grant new cards to his two children, said Nadim, who has been denied access to his client for more than two years.
Without an ID card the family cannot get passports or vote, register for a phone number or get utilities installed, buy property or enroll children in school, and could face delays at security checkpoints, among other things.
“Why are they punishing the entire family? It’s not justice, it’s cruelty,” Nadim said, adding he will challenge the decision in court in Peshawar this week.
Officials from the interior ministry did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
The refusal to grant ID cards means Afridi’s son and daughter are now facing problems getting admission to college, the doctor’s brother Jamil told AFP.
“So the family can’t go abroad and the children are facing difficulties in continuing their education,” he said.
Afridi was jailed for 33 years in May 2012 after he was convicted of ties to militants, a charge he has always denied. Some US lawmakers said the case was revenge for his help in the search for the al Qaeda chief.
Published in The Express Tribune, February 2nd, 2017.
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