Presenting a report of Senate Standing Committee on Law and Justice in the Senate, which discussed procedure for putting names in blacklist and its legal value, the committee chairman Javed Abbasi of PML-N said that indiscriminate use of the blacklist has no legal cover.
He said that senior officials told the committee, which was discussing blacklist issue, that it has no legal cover and respective governments had been using it for the last so many years without determining its legality.
He said when the official of the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) officials were asked about legal status of the blacklist, they said it has no legal status.
He said that FIA official acknowledged that respective governments failed to address the blacklist issue, adding this is high time this issue must be resolved, as it has made the country a laughing stock before the comity of nations.
Abbasi pointed out some instances in which officials of FIA and the Directorate of Immigration had stopped some people from travelling abroad, citing inclusion of their names in the blacklist purely on the orders of the government of the day.
"I don't blame any single government as it is a collective failure as no one knows what is the legal status of blacklist and we all should resolve this controversy the sooner the better," he added.