Pakistan Govt Officials Found Involved In Human Trafficking; 35 Suspended By FIA

LAHORE: Thirty-five officers of Pakistan's Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) have been dismissed from service for their involvement in human trafficking, an official statement said on Wednesday. According to the statement, criminal cases have been registered against 13 FIA officials.

"On the directive of Prime Minister of Pakistan Shehbaz Sharif, FIA Director General Ahmed Ishaq Jahangir conducted departmental hearings of 49 officials implicated in boat incidents and human smuggling," it said.

Four inspectors, 10 sub-inspectors, two ASIs, five head constables, and 14 constables involved in the boat incidents have been dismissed from service, it added. The DG said there is no place in the organisation for officials guilty of negligence and carelessness in boat incident cases.

"The purpose of departmental accountability is to rid the organisation of corrupt elements," he said. Three boats carrying migrants capsized in mid-December near the island of Gavdos, which is further south of Crete, and another boat capsized near the Peloponnese peninsula.

More than 80 Pakistanis drowned after boats carrying them capsized. Some 36 Pakistanis were rescued. The rest remain missing, which, as per a report from Pakistan's Embassy, should be presumed dead. Meanwhile, the bodies of four more Pakistanis who died in the boat tragedy have been recovered, taking the total number of recovered corpses to nine.

The boats, which departed from Libya's Tobruk port, also carried Bangladeshi, Egyptian and Sudanese nationals. Since the boats' tragedy, the authorities launched a countrywide crackdown on human traffickers, arresting over 30 so far.