Fake travel documents: Afghan national arrested

Shafiqa allegedly tried to use Spanish permanent resident card to board the Oslo-bound flight.

ISLAMABAD: Officials of the Federal Investigation Agency on Saturday arrested an Afghan attempting to board a Pakistan International Airlines flight from Benazir Bhutto International Airport to Norway for using false immigration documents.

The woman, Shafiqa, allegedly tried to use a Spanish permanent resident card to board the Oslo-bound flight. Afzal Niazi, the FIA official on duty, said the fake residence card was easily detectable manually.

“The lamination on the card was tampered with and the details changed,” said Niazi. The woman was sent to the Anti-Human Trafficking Cell of the FIA for further investigation and legal action, Niazi said. Though this is not the first case of travellers attempting to travel on false documents, the situation was unique in that an Afghan national attempted to use a Pakistani passport to leave the country.

“Had she flown undetected, there could have been complications as she was not a Pakistani,” said an FIA official.

Published in The Express Tribune, October 16^th, 2011.