101 ways to travel illegally, the FIA way

At least 11 Pakistanis were gunned down near the Pakistan-Iran border in Balochistan a few days ago. They were innocent people hoping to make a living in foreign lands and were hoping to cross over into Iran illegally from where their facilitators would have attempted to take them to Europe or other destinations. There’s no official word yet on why and who killed these 11 men. Thousands of Pakistanis have over the years tried to enter Europe and other lucrative destinations illegally, but not many have been lucky to live their dream.
In the last couple of years, at least 4,300 people have been deported back to Pakistan from Greece, Spain and other countries where they had managed to reach after enduring severe hardships, which come as a package deal with human traffickers. “If a person wants to go to Greece, the human traffickers demand Rs 1.2 to 1.4 million, including Rs 0.5 million for the passport arrangements, Rs 0.3 million as bribe for FIA officials, while the remaining amount is the trafficker’s fee,” an inside source told Pakistan Today.
“Most of the people who leave the country illegally belong to Gujrat, Gujranwala, Lala Musa and Lahore,” the source said.
The source revealed that the rate of a picture change (PC) passport ranges from Rs 50,000 to Rs 100,000, whereas the rates of fake visa stickers vary from country to country.
“Sometimes airport officials have very tight security checks. In such a scenario, the human traffickers, with the help of complicit FIA officials, first send the illegal travellers to Dubai on original passports. After reaching Dubai, they take away their original passports and hand them a picture changed (PC) passport with the visa of the country they wish to enter. Then there’s a fair chance; either the person will be successful in entering the country or will get deported,” he said.
Naveed Jutt, who was deported by the Greek authorities some days ago, told Pakistan Today that a human trafficker named Shahzad sent him in a group of 20 men to Karachi from where another human trafficker named Ali Nawaz took them to Quetta and made them enter Iran via the Taftan border.
“From Iran, a Pakistani named Aslam took us to the Turkish border and made us cross over at midnight. From the Turkish border, another human trafficker locked us in containers and took us to Istanbul. From there my relatives came and took me to their house,” he said.
“We were 20 when we left Pakistan. However, when we reached Istanbul there were just 17 of us left; three had died during the journey,” he revealed. He said that an FIA official took Rs 100,000 from him for clearance at the Islamabad airport when he came back to Pakistan for a visit a few years back.
Sources in a human trafficking racket said that another route into Europe is via Africa. He said that previously Pakistanis tried to enter Europe by land routes but have now started joining the Africans in attempts to use the ocean crossing.
“Pakistanis travel on valid documents to UAE and then head for African countries like Senegal and Mauritania, where they get visas on arrival. Then they start moving to various European countries, especially Spain and Greece,” he said.
The source revealed that with an increase in cultural tours, a new group of human traffickers has come up to the surface.
“Heads of entertainments groups and cultural troupes take around Rs 1,500,000 from people andtake them abroad by showing them as members of their entourage. A controversial Lahore-based film and stage actress is one of the many who are earning millions of rupees in this business,” he said. Sources in the FIA and human trafficking rackets said that another way of sending people abroad illegally is by transporting them on official passports.
“Every few years, official passports from the SL series, designated for government officials, are stolen from passport offices in Lahore, Karachi and Islamabad and are sold by human traffickers for Rs 700,000,” sources said, adding that holders of official passports are usually given visas by foreign embassies without proper checking.
However, an official of the FIA passport cell told Pakistan Today that possessing an official passport does not mean that a person can obtain visas easily. “It’s not cake walk…without the help of the immigration people the stolen passports are useless,” he said. A few months ago, the Pakistani embassy in Libya warned the Foreign Office that the FIA’s Immigration department was involved in human trafficking.
The embassy claimed that travel documents were being used for opening bogus vacancies in fake companies. FIA immigration officials in Islamabad are charging between Rs 25,000 and 50,000 per person to smuggle them to Libya, the report claimed.
However, defending the agency, FIA Deputy Director Nasir Jameel told Pakistan Today that the FIA was doing everything in its power to curb the menace of human trafficking.
He said that modern machinery has been installed at airports to deter human traffickers, claiming that the agency had been successful in curtailing human smuggling to a large extent.
He said that the FIA had arrested at least 165 people who were trying to board aeroplanes with fake passports. “We are alert to the new methods being employed by human smugglers and are doing our best to stop innocent citizens from falling into the hands of these dangerous people. The people who want to try their luck in foreign lands should use legal ways of going there…approaching human smugglers is the first step towards a death trap,” he said.