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| India-Pakistan |
| NAB chief grilled on Swiss bank account |
| 2009-12-10 |
| [Dawn] A Supreme Court bench hearing petitions against the National Reconciliation Ordinance (NRO) questioned the chairman of the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) on Wednesday about alleged laundered money lying frozen in a Swiss bank and the amount spent by the state on the case, but was disappointed by the answers. 'Not a single confidence-inspiring answer has been given,' Justice Mohammad Sair Ali, a member of the 17-judge bench, observed. He said that the replies given by NAB Chairman Nawid Ahsan lacked credibility. The court ordered Mr Ahsan to furnish by Thursday complete information about the status of $60 million allegedly laundered in the SGS case but lying dormant in the Swiss bank, status of the government's claim on the money and the names of claimants. If the government was not the claimant then where would the money go, why were the case documents picked up from a lawyer's office in Geneva and kept in Pakistan's high commission in London, who ordered the shifting of the papers and whether proceedings before the Swiss court and attorney general were terminated at the behest of NAB, the judges asked. The court continued to seek answers from NAB despite an assurance given by acting Attorney General Shah Khawar that all facts regarding the cases pending before the Swiss magistrate and attorney general would be provided. 'It appears that the court is widening the scope of the hearing, rather than focussing on the controversial amnesty law, by opening the entire gambit of cases pending even in foreign lands having no effect of the NRO,' a constitutional expert told Dawn. |
| Posted by:Fred |