Islamabad, April 25 || Pakistan's Standing Committee on Interior has been informed that over 12,000 Afghan nationals were caught with fake Pakistani passports while travelling to Saudi Arabia in the past five years, raising serious concerns over tens of thousands more such cases of Afghan nationals being able to get fake Pakistani passports and using them to travel to different countries, including the United Arab Emirates (UAE).
The revelation was done during a meeting of the Senate Standing Committee on Interior, which was briefed about the ongoing repatriation process and ongoing campaign to nab illegal Afghan nationals, along with the law and order situation in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) and Balochistan.
"At least 12,000 people reached Saudi Arabia on fake Pakistani passports. Of them, 3,000 had photo-swapped passports, while 6,000 passports were issued by tampering with the National Database and Registration Authority (NADRA) data," informed Director General Passports, Mustafa Jamal Qazi.
"Most of the people who travelled on these fake documents were deported to Afghanistan. None of them are now in Pakistan," he added.
Qazi also revealed that strict action was taken against officials of NADRA and Passport Department officials, including at least 35 Assistant Directors.