Joint body to probe bomb allegations, says Sherpao

ISLAMABAD—The Federal Minister for Interior Aftab Ahmed Khan Sherpao has termed the accusation of NWFP Chief Minister regarding the involvement of officials of Intelligence Bureau (IB) in planting explosives outside CM office unexpected and unnecessary.
Talking to reporters after attending a briefing about second phase of Machine Readable Passport (MRP) in DG Passport Office here Wednesday, the Interior Minister said that the Federal Government with the cooperation of the Provincial Government of NWFP would investigate the matter and a joint committee in this regard would be formed.
Interior Secretary Syed Kamal Shah and DG Passport Brig (retd) Khalid Habib and other high officials were also present on the occasion. Commenting on the statement of CM NWFP Akram Khan Durrani, the Interior Minister said that immense care is needed on such issues and the view of IB should also be heard
Expressing his views on the arrest of IB’s official after registering the FIR, the Interior Minister said that the provincial government is answerable to what steps they would take in this regard. Aftab Ahmed Sherpao said that we should not forget the services of intelligence agencies in the war on terror.
Earlier, while giving briefing in DG Passport Office, Aftab Ahmed Khan Sherpao said that Executive Committee of the National Economic Council (ECNEC) has reserved Rs 3.56 billion for second phase of Machine Readable Passport project.
Under the second phase of the project, the Passport Offices in the country and outside of the country would be modernized and Machine Readable Visa (MRV) and Machine Readable Motivated Border Control System would be inducted. At present 7 million people in the country have passport and out of which 2.9 million have Machine Readable passports.
The Interior Minister said that the 2nd phase was approved by ECNEC on November 30, 2006 and 16 new passport offices would be established including 4 in Punjab, 2 in Sindh, 5 in NWFP, 3 in Balochistan and one each in Northern Areas and Azad Kashmir.
Aftab Ahmed Khan Sherpao informed that 97 passport offices setup in foreign countries would be upgraded while 28 passport offices in the country have been modernized already equipped with MRP machines, adding that Rs 1.70 billion were spent in the first phase of MRP which started on March 2002 and would be completed in 2008.
The Interior Minister informed that the passport office got the revenue of Rs 4.48 billion in 2003-04, Rs. 5.19 billion in 2004-5 and Rs. 6.32 in 2005-06 which is a record.
Aftab Ahmed Khan Sherpao maintained that after the issuance of MRV, the design of Visa Sticker would be changed which would be helpful in Border Control System. He said that after 9/11, the overall situation regarding security was changed and such steps were imperative.
The Interior Minister said that land has been acquired for the establishment of new passport offices in Rawalpindi and Islamabad and work in this regard would start soon.—Agencies