Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif has taken strict action against Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) officials involved in facilitating human trafficking, following the tragic Greek boat incident in which at least five Pakistani nationals died.
The prime minister issued these directives during a meeting on Friday in Islamabad, with an aim to address the growing problem of human trafficking.
Prime Minister Shehbaz directed the relevant authorities to expedite the ongoing investigation into human trafficking and submit concrete recommendations as soon as possible. He stressed that such incidents tarnish Pakistan’s global image and must be addressed quickly and effectively.
“The delay in taking action against those responsible for last year’s ship sinking incident is worrying,” he said, adding: “We cannot allow this to continue as these tragedies only damage the reputation of our country.”
The meeting was briefed on preventive measures taken to combat human trafficking and provided an update on the recent Greek ship incident.
On Thursday, the Pakistani mission in Greece confirmed that five Pakistani nationals were among those who perished in the migrant boat tragedy near the Greek island of Gavdos. The mission stated, however, that it had “no concrete information” on the number of Pakistanis still missing.
An official from Pakistan’s mission in Greece provided the following update: “So far, we have identified five dead Pakistanis and rescued 47 others. There is no concrete information on missing persons at this time, and this is the latest information available.” .
Responding to local media reports, Pakistani Foreign Ministry spokesperson Mumtaz Zahra Baloch confirmed that the government had already released the official death toll, stating that there were no further updates at this time.
It is important to note that on Thursday, while launching a major crackdown on human traffickers involved in the deadly ship tragedy, the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) registered cases against three traffickers and arrested two of its own officers for negligence.
According to an official statement from the FIA, two officers, Inspector Zubair Ashraf and Sub-Inspector Shahid Imran, were arrested for neglecting their duties during passenger screening at Faisalabad airport.
Both officers were serving as shift managers when the 18 victims of the Greek ship disaster went through the selection process.
