Nat Geo’s green-eyed ‘Afghan girl’ arrested for bogus documents
Sharbat Gula, the world famous face of National Geographic, was arrested on the charges of getting Pakistan’s National Identity Card through bogus ways.
Sharbat Gula, the world famous face of National Geographic, was arrested on the charges of getting Pakistan’s National Identity Card through bogus ways.
An official of Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) confirmed that Sharbat Gula was arrested from her rented home at Nothya Peshawar on Wednesday. Soon after her arrest, Sharbat Gula was produced before a court of law and she was sent on judicial remand to Central Jail, Peshawar. She was later shifted to the FIA Detention Center at Hayatabad where she is being interrogated. Couple of days back, FIA arrested three officials of National Data Base Registration (NADRA) on the charges of their involvement in issuing NID to Sharbat Gula.
The FIA official confirmed that in preliminary investigation, Sharbat Gula has confirmed possession of both Pakistan and Afghanistan national identity cards. Sharbat Gula, now adult and mother of several children, had hit the headlines in both print and electronic media when the National Geographic took her picture in early 80’s when she was residing along with parents as a refugee in a tent camp in outskirts of Peshawar. Couple of years back she was again found by the National Geographic team. From last several months, government initiated a drive for unearthing those foreigners, especially Afghan nationals who have got the fake IDs. Thousands of NICs in possessions of not only Afghans but local people, mostly from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and adjoining Tribal Areas have been cancelled. The affected local people and leaders of different political forces have demanded of the government to restore such NICs and withdrawal of cases against the affected persons including officials and elected representatives of local government bodies.
The Telegraph adds: Her arrest followed reports that she, like many Afghans, had illegally procured false Pakistani identity cards - for herself and two men she claimed were her sons - in order to remain in the country. “If the case against Sharbat Bibi and her sons is proven in the court of the law, they will be sentenced to jail for five to 14 years,” said Shahid Ilyas, a senior Peshawar border official. It comes at a time when Pakistan’s estimated 2.5 million Afghan refugees, many of whom have no proper documentation, are under intense pressure to return to their homeland. A 12-year-old Ms Gula came to global attention after photographer Steve McCurry took her picture at the the Nasir Bagh refugee camp, close to the Afghan border.