Reports in the local media suggesting PML-N leader Shehbaz Sharif or one of his sons Soleiman Shehbaz had been acquitted in Britain was incorrect, claimed Shahzad Akbar, advisor to the PM on accountability, on Monday.
Britain’s National Crime Agency (NCA) had not acquitted anyone in any case because “there was no trial. Funds were frozen by NCA (which) decided to not investigate these funds”, he insisted.
NCA, he said, had not initiated this probe on the request of either Assets Recovery Unit or the NAB.
The inquiry was the result of a suspicious transaction reported by a bank to NCA. “Certain funds transferred by Soleiman Sharif from Pakistan to UK in 2019 were declared as being suspicious by UK authorities and NCA had secured an asset freezing order from (a UK) court.”
He claimed that the release of funds was not an acknowledgment that the funds (in question) “are from a legitimate source”.
The chief of the Asset Recovery Unit (ARU) said Soleiman Shehbaz “still remains a fugitive in money laundering case against him and his father Shahbaz Sharif” before an accountability court in Lahore.
Interestingly, NAB had proclaimed in June 2020 that massive corruption had been perpetrated by Hamza, Soleiman and Shahbaz Sharif and it would pursue and prove in British court that the accusations were true.
Reports on Monday claimed that NCA had launched probed after ARU sent a letter to the UK government on December 11, 2019, levelling serious allegation against Sharifs.
It was also claimed that the Westminster court has given a verdict against NCA decision to freeze the funds and after the court verdict the NCA restored the bank accounts of Shehbaz Sharif family.
from SAMAA https://ift.tt/39Ol6vr
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