British visa firms to partially resume work in Pak after security review

Islamabad, Oct 5 : The private firms in Pakistan handling visa applications for the British High Commission, will soon partially resume their operations, after shutting down its centres across the country for a month due to a terror threat, said a statement issued by the High Commission.

It said that the visa application centre in Karachi would reopen on October 8, and that in in Lahore is expected to resume functioning from October 13 following a review of security at the centres.

The visa application centres in Islamabad and Mirpur will remain closed "pending security upgrades" and the High Commission will announce re-opening dates "as soon as possible", The News quoted the statement as saying.

It added that access to the visa application centres would be "restricted to those with appointments only" and anyone arriving without an appointment "will be turned away".

The visa application centres were closed after the centre in Islamabad received a terror threat on September 4.

Besides shutting down its visa application centres, Britain had decided to pull out the children of all its diplomats in Islamabad.

ANI