S. Arabia deports 107 Pakistanis
LAHORE: Over 100 Pakistanis deported by Saudi Arabia on the charges of overstay in the kingdom arrived here on Tuesday.
They were detained by the Federal Investigation Agency at the Allama Iqbal International Airport for several hours for interrogation and then allowed to go home after verification that they are Pakistanis.
“A Saudi plane brought 107 Pakistanis, including 15 women, who were charged with overstay. We first verified whether all the deportees were Pakistani. After verifying this they were interrogated about their travel to Saudi Arabia,” FIA Deputy Director (Immigration) Ali Imam told Dawn.
Asked if any of the deportees was sent back to Saudi Arabia, he said ‘no’.
FIA interrogates deported people at Lahore airport
“All were verified as Pakistanis and allowed to go home after they recorded their statements about their travel and reasons for overstay in Saudi Arabia,” he added.
Under a new policy of the interior ministry, the FIA has been directed not to accept any deportee before verifying that he/she is a Pakistani national.
Earlier, the FIA had refused to allow entry to about 30 people deported from Greece. The agency ‘suspected them Afghans’ and sent them back to Greece on the special flight that brought them to Pakistan.
The FIA says it does not arrest a deportee unless he commits crimes such as visa tampering or illegally crossing into any other country from Pakistan.
An FIA official said most of the people deported from Saudi Arabia had been kept in jail for at least three months because of overstay. “Most of them travelled to Saudi Arabia on Umrah visa, but slipped there to find work,” the official said.
Published in Dawn, December 30th, 2015