Sharbat Bibi, who became famous as the "Afghan Girl" on the cover of National Geographic magazine, was arrested in Peshawar on Wednesday, Federal Investigation Agency officials told Dawn. Officials said Bibi was arrested for possessing a fradulent Computerised National Identity Card and being in possession of both Pakistani and Afghan identity cards. She has been charged under several sections of the Pakistan Penal Code and Prohibition of Corruption Act.

Officials of the National Database and Registration Authority are investigating the issuance of the CNICs, which are in violation of the organisation's policies, and have dismissed the information on her CNIC as incorrect. Two officials from the authority have also been suspended, Geo News reported.

Reports of a Pakistani department issuing the CNICS to Bibi and two men, claiming to be her sons, surfaced in February 2015. The government official who issued the documents to Bibi in Pakistan has secured bail-before-arrest, the Pakistani daily reported. He currently holds the post of deputy commissioner in the country's customs department.

Bibi's photograph, captured by Steve McCurry at the Nasir Bagh refugee camp in Peshawar in 1984, won international acclaim and was compared to Leonardo da Vinci's Mona Lisa. McCurry found her again in 2002. Her image become symbolic of the Soviet war in Afghanistan.

Pakistan currently provides refuge to an estimated three million Afghan refugees, most of whom are unregistered, according to Dawn.