Senators for effective legislation against illegal border crossing

ISLAMABAD: Senators Friday underlined the need for taking solid measures to enact effective legislation for curbing illegal border crossing with the help of human traffickers.

They were discussing the adjournment motion by Ateeq Sheikh regarding illegal border crossing by Pakistan citizens with assistance of human traffickers leading to severe consequences. Speaking on the occasion, Ateeq said according to reports 300 agents of human traffickers were still operating in the country, alluring the youth to jobs aboard while travelling on bogus travel documents where they had to face a number of hardships.

He said passport and other relevant departments should work hard and act on information as provided by the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) which gets information from those who were deported from any country.

Thus, he said, vibrant legislation should be enacted to effectively tackle such challenges. He said such illegal youth were ditched by those agents and they had to face numerous problems, as about 450 Pakistanis were reported in Turkey who did not even have money to fly to Pakistan.

Rehman Malik said mostly underemployed people were trapped at the hand of human trafficker agents adding relevant laws were existing like an Ordinance for illegal immigration which could be further improved.

Jehanzeb Jamal Dinni urged the government to take tangible measures and create more job opportunities. Usman Kakar said people leave their houses and seek jobs abroad due to unemployment and poverty, adding the government should create more job opportunities to discourage the trend, adding the country’s youth should be given concessions in foreign countries. He said arresting youth when they were deported did not resolve issues and they should be given jobs instead.

Barrister Saif said though immigration ordinance existed it was a toothless document and its post-offence clauses were weak which should be made stringent to effectively tackle the issue. He said Pakistan had ratified international conventions regarding human trafficking but these were not implemented in letter and spirit. Nighat said the government should take care of the youth and provide jobs to them, enabling them to earn livelihood for their families. Senator Taj Haider underlined the need for creating more employment opportunities, adding Zulfikar Bhatto also pursued diplomacy channels to provide job opportunities in other countries.

Nihal Hashmi said it was not only an issue in Pakistan but it had become a global issue, adding making further legislation would not serve the purpose as relevant laws already exist and they could be revisited to have better results.