Plot afoot to spare Sharif family — PTI

PM’s lawyers submit second letter from Qatari prince as court continues hearing into Panama Papers case

Leaders of the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) have alleged that fake documents are being drawn up, with the involvement of national institutions, to protect Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and his family.

Party leaders Fawad Chaudhry, Arif Alvi, Shibli Faraz and Fayaz-ur-Hasan Chohan made the claim yesterday, while talking to journalists outside the Supreme Court of Pakistan in Islamabad, during a break of proceedings in the Panama leaks case.

“Our stance is proving correct that no national institution can probe the allegations in Panama leaks case independently and without any pressure [as long as] Nawaz Sharif and PML (N) are in government,” Chaudhry said.

“Federal ministers are pressurising the Supreme Court to save the skin of their leader Nawaz Sharif in the Panama case,” he added.

He said the Federal Bureau of Revenue (FBR) — instead of providing evidence and documents of the Sharif family’s financial malpractices — was busy working out fake documents to present falsehoods as truth.

He also alleged officers in other institutions were involved in making the fake documents to ensure Nawaz is found not guilty in the Panama leaks case.

PML-N leaders, including Khawaja Saad Rafique, are trying to pressure the apex court on the matter of Maryam Nawaz being PM’s dependant, he said.

Meanwhile, PTI lawmaker Arif Alvi said the government was trying to make fools of the court and nation, while seeking to hide the truth disclosed in the Panama Leaks case.

‘Lies’

PM Nawaz Sharif is getting trapped with every passing day under the lies PML (N) leaders are uttering in public and to the media, he said.

Sharif will soon become a “model” for everyone as his lies are disclosed through different techniques, he said.

Chohan said PM Sharif had defamed and insulted Pakistan after lying to the court, parliament and nation and now members of his government were regularly speaking lies to hide their corruption.

Meanwhile, the Sharif family yesterday submitted a second letter from a Qatari prince in the Supreme Court to establish the money trail behind four London apartments, which are at the centre of the Panamagate trial being heard by a five-judge bench of the Supreme Court.

In the letter to the court, Qatari Prince Hamad Bin Jasim Bin Jaber Al Thani claimed that an investment of 12 million riyals ($3.26 million) contributed by Mohammad Sharif (father of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif) was made “by way of provision of cash”.