Names of Dr Shakil Afridi, wife, two children put on ECL

PESHAWAR: The Ministry of Interior has placed the names of Dr Shakil Afridi, his wife and two children on the Exit Control List (ECL).

Dr Shakil Afridi, who is presently lodged at the Peshawar Central Prison, is believed to have helped the CIA hunt down al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden through a fake vaccination campaign in Abbottabad. The al-Qaeda founder was killed by the US Navy Seals in a raid on his compound in Abbottabad in May 2011.

“The names of Dr Shakil Afridi, his wife Imrana Ghafoor, and two children Zaim Khan and Manoor Khan were placed on the ECL,” Jamil Afridi, the brother of Dr Shakil Afridi, told The News on Tuesday.

“The children of Dr Shakil Afridi are facing difficulties in getting admission in colleges as the National Database and Registration Authority (Nadra) refused to issue computerised national identity cards (CNIC) to them. The Nadra officials said that their names were blocked and on ECL,” Jamil Afridi added. He said that he was going to challenge the Interior Ministry decision in the Peshawar High Court.

According to Jamil Afridi, the CNIC of Dr Shakil Afridi expired in 2014 and the prison authorities didn’t allow him to get it renewed.   The issue of Dr Shakil Afridi resurfaced after the victory of Donald Trump in the US presidential election. During his election campaign Trump had declared that he would not waste any time and get Dr Shakil Afridi freed from Pakistani custody within two minutes after becoming the president.

However, on January 17, 2017 the federal Law Minister Zahid Hamid told the Senate that Dr Shakil Afridi was a hero for the US, but a culprit for Pakistan and would neither be released nor handed over to the US.

He said that Shakil Afridi was involved in anti-state activities and was arrested in May 2011.The minister said Dr Shakil Afridi helped the US track down Osama bin Laden under the cover of a fake vaccination campaign run by him in Abbottabad.

Dr Shakil Afridi, who was serving as the agency surgeon in Khyber Agency, was arrested in May 2011 by an intelligence agency on the suspicion that he had helped the CIA in tracking down Osama bin Laden.

He was tried under the Frontier Crimes Regulation (FCR) by an assistant political agent in his capacity as additional district magistrate and convicted on multiple charges. Since 2014, his review petition has been pending before the Fata Tribunal.

The Fata Tribunal sought record of Dr Shakil Afridi’s trial from the political administration of Khyber Agency. The trial’s record was recently submitted to the Fata Tribnnal, but the prosecutors have not appeared in the case that has led to its repeated adjournment.The case will now be heard on February 9.