KARACHI, Oct 5: The Federal Investigation Agency’s immigration staff arrested on Thursday Inspector Sarwar Khan, better known as Sarwar Commando, at the Jinnah Terminal where he had gone to board a Dubai-bound flight.

Inspector Sarwar, who was wanted in the extra-judicial killing case of Mashooq Brohi, arrived at the airport to leave for the Gulf state by Emirate’s flight EK-605 at 5.45am. “He was recognized by two FIA officials who had acquired police commando training from him at the Shahdadpur Police Training Centre,” Assistant Director Khaliquzzaman told Dawn.

He said Inspector Sarwar Khan’s passport did not indicate that he was a government servant, nor could he produce any no-objection certificate issued by the government for his travel abroad. “Subsequently, he was offloaded and taken into custody for trying to travel abroad on fake documents as he had obtained the new passport in his private capacity.”

Sarwar Commando, one of the few surviving figures of the 1992 Karachi Operation, was later handed over to the FIA’s Passport Circle for further legal action.

Immigration sources said immediately after the offloading of the police officials, the investigation cell of the Airport police approached the FIA staff and sought his custody. “However, Inspector Sarwar Commando was not handed over to police by the immigration staff and he was sent to the FIA’s Passport Circle for further legal action,” they said.

Additional Director Mohammad Malik of the FIA’s Passport Circle said a criminal case against Sarwar Commando was registered under Section 6 (1) (a) (c) of the Passport Act, 1947 after completing all legal formalities within an hour.

“He will be produced before the judicial magistrate for obtaining his remand on Friday,” he added.

Meanwhile, police sources said Inspector Sarwar Commando was wanted in a case under FIR No. 101/206 of Sakrand police station, Nawabshah, as an accused in the Mashooq Brohi killing case.

They said as many as 12 police officials, including SP Aslam Khan, DSP Irfan Bahadur and Inspector Bahauddin Babar, had already been in judicial custody, while 36 other officials were absconding.

The sources said police would take the custody of Sarwar Commando on Friday from the FIA and he would be shifted to Sakrand for investigation and interrogation in the Mashooq Brohi killing case.