Pakistan to contact Interpol to bring back Brahamdagh: Nisar

ISLAMABAD: Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan on Friday said Pakistan will contact Interpol to bring Baloch Republican Party chief Brahamdagh Bugti back to the country.

Addressing a press conference here, he said India’s offer of citizenship to Brahamdagh Bugti made it clear to everyone who is supporting terrorism in Balochistan. He said the measure had substantiated the Indian prime minister’s statement of interference in Pakistan.

Nisar said the issue of torture of Motorway Police personnel by some military officers on Motorway was a serious matter and a test case for the army. He said the Chief of Army Staff General Raheel Sharif has set very good traditions and it is hoped that he will follow the same traditions in this case.

The minister said Pakistan cannot initiate any investigation of the Uri attack because India itself does not have any evidence for it. Nisar said when Indians themselves have no proof, then what kind of action could Pakistan take. He said India has only levelled an accusation and that too only to defame Pakistan.

“We have not placed any restrictions or censorship on the media here. It is them who have placed censorship, because when their lies were exposed, they had to enforce censorship,” he said.

The minister said that a multi-pronged mechanism has been introduced in the National Database and Registration Authority (Nadra) as national security drive. He said e-passport system will be introduced in the country during the next three months. He said Nadra centres will be set up in big cities, including Karachi, Lahore, Gujranwala, Peshawar and Quetta during the next five months. He said these centres will be later extended to the whole country. He said a monitoring helpline of Nadra will be set up, which will be directly supervised by the Ministry of Interior.

The minister said work on the re-verification of CNICs and passports was underway. He said fake CNICs and passports had been blocked. He said action was also being taken against those Nadra officials who were involved in illegal activities.

Chaudhry Nisar said that during the last four months, 82.5 million CNICs out of 105 million had been verified. He said out of these, about 60,000 were fake. He said 50,000 fake CNICs have been blocked and intelligence agencies are working on the reaming 10,000 CNICs.

The minister said 2,000 fake passports have also been blocked. He said 29,000 passports have been issued to foreigners. He said during the re-verification of passports, about 2,000 foreigners have returned their passports voluntarily.

Chaudhry Nisar said 18 Nadra officials have been identified for being involved in the heinous crime of selling nationality against money by issuing national identity cards. He said eight of them have been arrested and seven others are on pre-arrest bail and one is at large.

Nisar said the result of PP-07 by-election in Rawalpindi will be in favour of the PML-N despite all efforts of opponents. He said if the Election Commission imposes restriction on public representatives to participate in by-polls rallies, then it should impose restrictions on all parties and not on a single party. If anyone violates the restriction, the ECP should punish them.