| Federal Investigation Agency Urdu: وفاقی ادارۂ تحقیقات |
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| Abbreviation | FIA |
| The Federal Investigation Agency emblem | |
| Motto | Urdu: صداقت دیانت |
| Accuracy and Honesty | |
| Agency overview | |
|---|---|
| Formed | 1975 |
| Preceding agency | Pakistan Special Police Establishment (1948) |
| Legal personality | Governmental: Government agency |
| Jurisdictional structure | |
| Federal agency | Pakistan |
| Governing body | Government of Pakistan |
| Constituting instrument | Federal Investigation Agency Act, 1974[1] |
| General nature |
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| Operational structure | |
| Headquarters | Islamabad |
| Agency executive | Waseem Ahmed, PSP, Director General |
| Wings |
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| Website | |
| http://www.fia.gov.pk/ | |
The Federal Investigation Agency (acronym: FIA) (Urdu: وفاقی ادارۂ تحقیقات) is an agency of Pakistan, under the Ministry of Interior, that serves as a federal criminal investigative body. It has a wide role in combating terrorism, fascism, corruption, human smuggling and copyright infringement policing, similar in function to the USA's FBI. The FIA is mandated as the liason agency for the Pakistani body of Interpol. Its motto is Accuracy and Honesty.
The FIA's headquarters is located in G-9/4 in Islamabad. It has various branch offices located in all major cities across Pakistan.
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To achieve excellence in FIA by promoting culture of merit, providing continuous professional training, ensuring effective internal accountability, encouraging use of technology and having a meaningful feedback mechanism.[2]
A federally controlled Police Establishment first came into existence in 1942 during the Second World War to take up investigation of corruption, rampant in the Supplies and Procurement Department of the then British Raj. It was named as Special Police Establishment. After the end of the British Raj and the Independence of Pakistan in 1947, it was renamed to Pakistan Special Police Establishment (PSPE). The said establishment was given a schedule of offenses with Ordinance VIII of 1948. With the passage of time, the PSPE, apart from investigating the offenses of bribery and corruption against Central Government Employees, was also given powers to investigate cases relating to the offenses under the following laws:-
i. Official Secret Act, 1923
ii. Foreign Exchange Regulation Act, 1947
iii. Passport Offenses Act, 1952
iv. Customs Act, 1959
The FIA was established in 1975 under the Federal Investigation Agency Act, 1974 and superseded the Pakistan Special Police Establishment.
In 2005, to deal with the growing indigenous terrorist problem, the FIA formed an elite Counter Terrorism unit named Special Investigation Group (SIG). The SIG comprises 87 investigation officers and 13 Specialists in IT, Explosives, Banking and Law. The US, the UK, Germany and the UNODC have provided extensive training and equipment to the SIG. The Federal Government notifies the SIG to investigate offences punishable under the Anti-Terrorism Act, 1997 jointly with provincial police departments.[3]
In 2001 a petition was filed in the USA which disputed Pakistan's commitment to rooting out piracy within its national borders. In 2005, Pakistan was en-route to having its US duty-free Generalised System of Preferences (GSP) being taken away from it. Thus in order to avert any further negative fallout, sections of the Copyright Ordinance 1962 were included in the FIA's schedule of offences. This legislation paved the way in 2005, under the direction of the federal interior ministry, to raid the country's largest video wholesale centre: The Rainbow Centre. Raiding the factories of the dealers that operated within the centre proved to be a highly successful entreprise, resulting in a reduction of 60% of sales of pirated video material. A spokesman from the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI), later confirmed, that many of the outlets had stopped selling pirated video goods and were now selling mobile phones, highlighting that the FIA's raids and the resultant legal action was a success.[4]
It was also reported that 5 FIA personnel were investigated for their alleged role in human trafficking and most of them were dismissed from the service.[5]
In 2006, the FIA resumed operational links with its Indian counterpart, the Central Bureau of Investigation, after a gap of 17 years.[6][7]
FIA participates in the PISCES project which was initiated by the US Department of State, Terrorist Interdiction Program (TIP) in 1997, as a system to improve their watchlisting capabilities by providing a mainframe computer system to facilitate immigration processing. PISCES system has been installed at seven major airports of the country i.e. Islamabad, Karachi, Lahore, Peshawar, Quetta, Multan and Faisalabad airports. The system has provision to accommodate information on suspects from all law enforcement agencies like Immigration, Police, Narcotics Control, Anti-smuggling, and Intelligence Services. [8]
The FIA is organized into functional Wings and the office of the Director General. The Director General is assisted by three Additional Director Generals (Crime, Immigration and Administration) and eight directors for the effective monitoring and smooth functioning of the operations spread all over the country. Three of the directors are responsible for SIG, NCB and Legal Branch and the other five are placed in the strategic capitals of each state, Lahore, Karachi, Peshawar, Quetta and Islamabad Capital Territory. A deputy director assists with the functioning of the SIU.
The FIA training academy was first opened for use in 1976 specifically to train/equip new FIA recruits, though its scope was enhanced and now Police Officers, Army/Air Force Officers, NAB and members of other agencies participate in different courses which are conducted at the academy.
Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) has its Headquarter in Islamabad. The Chief Presiding Officer of the Agency is called the Director General, same is appointed by Ministry of Interior. The Headquarter provide support to 4 Provincial offices, i-e Sindh, Punjab, KPK, Balochistan & Federal Capital Islamabad. The Provincial heads of Agency are called Directors. Further there are about (?) smaller offices known as Wings or Circles e.g Crime, Corporate Crime, Banking Crime and Anti-Human Trafficking Circles at provincial level, they are headed by Additional and Deputy Directors, these are helped by Investigation officers(I.O) like Assistant Directors, Inspectors, Sub-Inspectors and Assistant Sub-Inspectors etc for running of bureau business. The Wings are major segments of Agency known as Anti-Corruption or Crime Wing, Immigration Wing, Technical Wing, Legal Wing and Administration Wing. Further there are branches working under the command of above-mentioned Wings viz Counter terrorism branch (SIG), Interpol branch, Legal branch, Crime branch, Economic crime branch, Intellectual Property Rights branch, Immigration branch, Anti-Human Smuggling branch, PISCES branch, Administration branch, Implementation and monitoring branch.
The FIA is headed by a Director-General (DG), appointed by the federal government, generally a very senior Police Officer of BPS 21/22, based at the Headquarters in Islamabad. The current FIA Director General is Syed Tahsin Anwar Ali of the Police Service of Pakistan who was appointed in Jun, 2011, succeeding the former DG Malik Muhammad Iqbal.
The FIA office in Lahore was targeted during the Lahore twin suicide bombings. The building was severely damaged during the suicidal attack. Geo News later reported that "The building also housed the offices of a special US-trained unit created to counter terrorism" suggesting a motive.[9]
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