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Pakistani-American teen, father barred from U.S.

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Pakistani-American teen, father barred from U.S.

By Gina Keating

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - A Pakistani-American born in the United States said on Wednesday he has been barred from re-entering the country apparently because he chose the wrong person to list in the emergency contact portion of his U.S. passport.

Jaber Ismail, 18, and his 45-year-old father, Muhammed, a naturalized citizen, five years ago listed as an emergency contact in their U.S. passports a close relative who was convicted of a terrorism-related crime in April.

Jaber Ismail arrived in Pakistan with his family nearly five years ago to study and memorize the Koran. He completed that task and tried to return to Lodi with his family in April, the same month his cousin, Hamid Hayat, was convicted of providing material support to terrorists by attending training camps in Pakistan, and of lying about it to the FBI.

U.S. Customs officials at the Hong Kong airport, where they were catching a U.S.-bound connecting flight, told the father and son, "your passports aren't in the system. You have no record in the U.S.," Jaber Ismail told Reuters in a telephone interview from Rawalpindi on Wednesday.

"I said, 'I am a U.S. citizen. I was born there.' I showed them my birth certificate, my school ID. They wouldn't listen."

Jaber Ismail's mother and two younger siblings, who were not on the no-fly list, returned to home to Lodi.

The Ismail men were forced to return to Pakistan and have been living with relatives in Rawalpindi, he said.

FBI agents in Islamabad told the Ismails that they had been placed on the no-fly list because they had listed the Hayats as emergency contacts on their passports, Jaber Ismail said.

His uncle, Umer Hayat, was sentenced last week to time served after pleading guilty to lying about how much money he was carrying on a trip to Pakistan from the United States.


U.S. officials say that even though the Ismails are on the no-fly list and cannot fly from Pakistan to the United States, they probably could re-enter the country by land or sea, provided their passports haven't been revoked.

But Julia Harumi Mass, an American Civil Liberties Union attorney representing the Ismail family, said the men fear being stuck in Mexico or Canada if they are not admitted.

"There aren't any charges against them.... They are effectively holding them hostage in a foreign country," Mass said.

Jaber Ismail said FBI agents at the U.S. Embassy in Islamabad interviewed him at length about his uncle and cousin and whether he knew anything about terrorist training camps.

He said the agents told him that he and his father would be denied entry into the United States unless they submitted to more questioning and a lie detector test.

"I was at a mosque. I was memorizing the Koran because it was important to my mom," Ismail said. "I want to go home and finish high school and get a good job."

Quite a quandary for the family.
 
Indeed... Let's see perhaps its just a goofup of the America's system and the guy at the desk handling their case saw a terrorist contact and played it safe.

They'd probably investigate further...
 
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