ISLAMABAD:GUJRANWALA: Iranian border forces have killed two migrants from Gujranwala on the border with Pakistan, the families said on Tuesday.
Lakht-e-Abbas and Sarfaraz, in their 20s, were trying to illegally cross into Iran when they were spotted and shot by the Iranian border guards. They died on the spot.
Eleven people are still missing.
“My son left the home on March 13 carrying Rs. 50,000,” Abbas’s father said. “The agent contacted me yesterday and asked me to collect his dead body.”
A group of 13 young men mostly from Punjab had left for Iran on March 13 with a human smuggler, who was identified by the victim’s family as Faisal.
Sarfaraz’s family has demanded that government act against human smugglers.
“Government should take urgent steps to end the human smuggling and save lives,” Sarfaraz’s uncle told SAMAA.
Thousands of Pakistanis risk their lives every year to travel to Europe in search of better opportunities but the majority ends up in jail or dead.
In November last year, 20 people attempting to unlawfully cross the Pakistan-Iran border were killed by separatists in Turbat, Balochistan.
In a report submitted in the Supreme Court, the FIA had revealed that 6,767 Pakistanis entered the European countries illegally through Iran in 2017 alone.
“27,749 were deported — 18,810 from Iran, 4,401 from Turkey and 4,538 from European countries,” the report said.
The report had identified Gujranwala as “the origin of the majority” of them.
“The illegal migrants leave Pakistan through unofficial border crossings located along unfrequented routes into Iran,” the report said.
APP/AFP