FIA foils human smuggling attempts at Karachi airport

The Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) Immigration has foiled two separate attempts to illegally travel to Europe under the guise of Umrah and visit visas, arresting seven passengers at Jinnah International Airport, Karachi.

According to the FIA spokesperson, during a major operation at Jinnah International Airport, five passengers attempting to travel to Italy via Saudi Arabia under Umrah visas were offloaded from flight PA-170.

The passengers were identified as Raheedullah, Abdul Hameed, Abdul Shakoor, Ismail, and Ahmadullah — residents of Bannu, Peshawar, Khyber and Mohmand districts.

During emigration clearance, the passengers were found to be suspicious.

Initial investigations revealed that they were in contact with human smuggling agents based in Peshawar. The suspects had planned to travel from Saudi Arabia to Egypt and then Libya from where they intended to enter Italy illegally via sea routes.

Each had paid Rs4.5 million to the agents, agreeing to pay an additional Rs1.5 million upon reaching Libya.

The five passengers were handed over to the FIA’s Anti-Human Trafficking Circle in Karachi for further investigation.

In a separate operation, the FIA Immigration intercepted two passengers attempting to illegally travel to Belarus under the cover of visit visas. The passengers, identified as Muhammad Akash and Asad Rehman from Kotli, Azad Kashmir, were offloaded from flight FZ-330 bound for Azerbaijan.

During checks, immigration officials found their documents suspicious. Preliminary investigation showed that the passengers were in contact with an agent based in Rawalpindi.

Rehman’s passport was found to be tampered with, with visa pages missing. Fake protector stamps, forged visas and counterfeit police character certificates were also recovered from their luggage.

FIA officials said fake Azerbaijani work visas, bank transaction receipts and other forged documents were found on their mobile phones. The suspects had planned to enter Belarus illegally after reaching Azerbaijan and had paid Rs1.6 million each to the agent. Both the men were later transferred to the FIA’s Anti-Human Trafficking Circle Karachi for initiation of legal proceedings.