The judicial commission to probe the Abbottabad incident on Tuesday imposed a ban on foreign travel for everyone, including Dr Shakeel Afridi, involved in the probe and directed the government to not allow anyone to leave the country without clearance from the commission.
“The Abbottabad Commission has imposed a ban on travelling abroad for all persons related to the Abbottabad incident including Dr Shakeel Afridi until further orders,” said a statement by commission spokesman Adnan Manzoor. “No such person should be allowed to leave the country without clearance from the Abbottabad Commission,” the high-level four-member commission said.
The US authorities had been pressurising Pakistan for imminent release of Afridi, the man arrested in suspicion for launching a vaccination campaign near the alleged compound of al Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden to get clue. The move seems a pre-emptive act on the part of the commission to foil any secret agreement between Pakistan and the US for the release of Afridi, who had allegedly played a role in helping the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) trace bin Laden’s whereabouts. In July, the commission had also banned bin Laden’s wives and children from leaving the country.
Afridi had run a phony vaccination programme in an area of Abbottabad where the al Qaeda leader was in hiding, in an effort to obtain a DNA sample from him. He was detained by authorities, but has not been charged with any crime yet. Several media reports claimed that the CIA wanted Afridi released immediately.