Sindh

Bin laden’s death: US visas not affected: officer

The US consulate in Karachi, while heavily guarded, will continue its visa work.

Express May 03, 2011

KARACHI:

The US consulate in Karachi, while heavily guarded, will continue its visa work.

“Our regular visa interview schedule is running without any interruption,” consulate information officer Andrea DeArment told The Express Tribune on Monday. “In fact our Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Michael B Kirby visited the consulate just last week to check on how the visa consular services were coming along.”

According to DeArment, the slight lag in interview dates is due to the “great backlog” of applications that followed their launch of services from the city. “Many people knew we were about to start processing from Karachi and they waited to submit their applications here,” she explained. “But it is encouraging to see how many people want to travel to the United States.”

To cope with the large number of applications, DeArment said they plan to increase their staff strength by July. “Since we are dealing with all non-immigrant visas for all of Sindh and Balochistan, we need the additional workforce in order to keep functioning efficiently,” she said.

Published in The Express Tribune, May 3^rd, 2011.

COMMENTS (4)

Observer | 12 years ago | Reply why are people ridiculing those who want to go to the U.S.? At the end of the day, if you are unable to earn an honest living and keep your children safe, what is the point....they are doing right by their families and getting the hell out of Pakistan.

Maddog Qadafhi | 12 years ago | Reply "Everyone knows that US is responsible for all the troubles of our country !!" More like everyone wants to believe this true so they sleep at night. Pakistan needs to look at itself in the mirror instead of constantly coming up with crazy conspiracy theories to evade self-critical analysis. "Even after knowing that, why do they want to travel to that country of decadent values?" This coming from a country whose President is Mr. 10%, where you can bribe the local policeman at the drop of a hat, where 90% of the population cheats and does not pay their taxes, where women can be gang raped and their prepetrators are set free. The list could go on. And you want to call other countries decadent? What a joke.