The Central Investigation Bureau (CIB) nabbed the siblings--Jayang Tenzin, 15, and his sister Tsering Lhamo, 12-- as they were proceeding to board a Qatar Airways flight with other members of their family who have been living in the US under refuge status. [break]
The Nepali passports possessed by them have authentic US visa stamps valid for three months. Also arrested with them was one Chhering Tashi Gurung, reportedly a broker who was supposed to slip them on board the flight, and he was carrying Rs 50,000 to buy off immigration officials, said officials.
According to DSP Pravin Pokhrel of CIB, the refugee siblings were trying to slip onto the flight in the company of their parents--Jyamba and Chode, both of whom possess US travel visas-- and a younger brother who is a US national by birth. Both parents and their youngest child were released after brief interrogations.
Refugees residing in Nepal can travel abroad with travel documents issued by the authorities concerned but this is the first time that refugees have illegally gotten hold of Nepali passports.
Both the teenagers have authentic Nepali passports (serial numbers 5218241 and 5218246), which mention their address as Kiwul VDC-2 of Sindhupalchowk district. "The trend of using tampered passports is very common even among refugees but possession of authentic Nepali passports is something never seen before," said officials.
The CIB team had arrested the teenage refugees after they were able to get the boarding passes inside the terminal building. Police also extracted from them an enveloped recommendation letter, dated Feb 8, 2011 and issued by the Tibetan Refugee Welfare Office, which states that both are Tibetan refugees.
"It is clear that they have gotten authentic passports by producing fake documents," said DSP Pokhrel.
Police recovered from the refugee siblings ´crucial´ documents issued by the US embassy in its own official envelopes. On the envelopes is typed an instruction which reads: To be submitted to the US Immigration Office upon arrival at the airport for entry into the United States of America.
The seizure of the embassy documents shows that embassy officials were well aware of the teenagers´ refugee status, CIB officials claim.
"We were quite surprised to extract the refugee identity card, the recommendation letter of the Tibetan Refugee Welfare Community and, most importantly, the embassy´s secret documents all together," said CIB officials. "
"We have not yet opened the embassy document as the circumstances are very serious,´ said DSP Pokhrel.
The embassy had provided the enveloped documents to both the refugee teenagers. CIB Officials said that they would open the documents only in the presence of US embassy officials.
CIB said that some names of Immigration Department and Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) officials have been identified during preliminary investigations into the case.
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