RAWALPINDI, March 6: A batch of 96 illegal Pakistani immigrants will arrive here on Wednesday from the United States by a chartered flight, Dawn has learnt.

The Pakistani immigration authorities said the detainees guarded by US security officials would reach the Islamabad airport at around 1:30am.

Out of the 96 Pakistanis, some were taken in for overstay and travelling on fake documents, while the others faced criminal charges.

The latter had served their sentences in US jails and were now being deported to Pakistan.

The deportees will be handed over to the Pakistani immigration officials for further investigation.

More than 2,000 Pakistanis have been deported from the US since 9/11 terrorist attacks on New York and Washington. The last batch of 57 people deported from the US arrived in Islamabad in May 2006.