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51 deportees arrive from United States

By Shahzad Malik

ISLAMABAD: Fifty-one Pakistanis deported from the United States for violating various laws reached Islamabad by a chartered flight on Wednesday.

The US embassy spokesman in Pakistan told Daily Times that the deportees were involved in several cases including fraud, forgery, burglary, drug smuggling, murder, illegal immigration, sexual assault, rape and possession of illegal weapons.

“The governments of the US and Pakistan coordinated with each other through the Department of Homeland Security and the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) for the deportation of these people,” the spokesman said.

US law enforcement agencies arrested them in Virginia and Texas. Up to 29 deportees was jailed for over 18 months while the rest of them had been in jail for over eight months, FIA sources told Daily Times.

A chartered flight carrying the deportees landed at the Islamabad International Airport at 12.30pm. Officials of the Pakistani embassy in the US and US commandos accompanied the deportees.

Most of the deportees are from the interior parts of Punjab. Emotional scenes were witnessed at the airport when the plane landed as the deportees kissed the land after getting off the plane.

Naveed Ahmed, one of the deportees, told his family that US law enforcers had put him behind bars on charges of having a “long beard”. He said the deportees were handcuffed in the plane during the 19-hour flight.

He said US security personnel raided his house in Virginia because of his suspected links with extremists but they could not prove the charge.

Tanveer Khan, another deportee, said that Muslim prisoners in the US were treated roughly and they were not given proper food.

Syed Kaleem Imam, the FIA Immigration Cell deputy director, said the deportees were allowed to go to their hometowns after brief interrogation. He said none of the deportees was carrying illegal documents or wanted by Pakistani law enforcement agencies. He said the Pakistani embassy had given $30 to every deportee so that they could reach their hometowns.

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