FIA arrests Mauritania land route human smuggler in Faisalabad

FAISALABAD: The FIA has said that the land route agent in Mauritania, involved in human smuggling has been arrested by its officials.

The Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) has disclosed that accused Mubashir Enayat had received 4.7 million rupees from a citizen assuring him a job in Spain.

Accused Mubashir sent the man to Senegal from Mauritania on a visit visa, officials stated. “The citizen refused to travel in a boat to Europe,” investigation agency officials said.

The FIA has recovered a mobile phone and other evidence from the accused.

The agency is conducting raids to arrest other operatives of the human smuggling network, officials added.

Seven Pakistani survivors of the recent Morocco boat tragedy have been repatriated to the country.

The survivors included Muhammad Asif, Muhammad Abbas, Mudassar Hussain, Imran Iqbal, Uzair Basharat, Shoaib Zafar and Aamir Ali, who hail from Gujrat, Hafizabad, Sialkot, Mandi Bahauddin and Gujranwala districts of Punjab.

FIA’s Immigration cell took all the individuals into custody at Islamabad Airport and transferred them to the circle for questioning, where an investigation officer recorded their statements.

While narrating their ordeal, they confirmed that human traffickers brutally tortured them. They also provided details about the traffickers and agents involved in sending them abroad, leading the FIA to expand its investigation.

Preliminary findings suggest that the migrants attempted to cross into Spain illegally via Senegal, paying agents between Rs1.6 million to Rs2.5 million per person.

Earlier, a four-member Pakistani investigative committee in Morocco recorded the statements of the Pakistani nationals who survived the Morocco boat incident.

In their statement, the Pakistani nationals termed the incident a ‘mass killing,’ claiming that the human traffickers stopped the journey in open waters and demanded ransoms from those onboard.

According to survivors, as many as 21 Pakistani nationals were allowed to leave in the boat after they paid the ransom to the human traffickers.

The Pakistani nationals claimed that most of the victims lost their lives due to severe cold and torture while the boat also lacked sufficient stocks of food supplies and drinking water.

Sources said that the boat was operated by the international human trafficking racket which includes traffickers from Senegal, Mauritania and Morocco.