ISLAMABAD – Advisor to Prime Minister on Accountability and Interior Shahzad Akbar on Monday rejected a news report about the acquittal of PML-N president Shehbaz Sharif and his son in a money laundering case in the United Kingdom as “incorrect and misreporting”.
Earlier in the day, reports emerged claiming that a court in the UK has acquitted Shehbaz Sharif and Suleman Shehbaz of charges related to money laundering and corruption.
In fact, the court has restored the bank accounts of the PML-N leaders after Britain’s National Crime Agency (NCA) found no evidence in a probe of suspicious transaction made in 2019.
Akbar said, “The investigation by the NCA against Suleiman Shabaz and some of his family members was not initiated at the request of ARU or NAB”.
“It was a result of a suspicious transaction reported by a bank to NCA.Certain funds transferred by Suleiman Shabaz from Pakistan to UK in 2019 were declared as suspicious transaction by the UK authorities &NCA secured an asset freezing order(AFO) from court against these funds,” he wrote on Twitter.
“However recently NCA decided to stop investigating these funds and therefore agreed for release of these funds through court,” Akbar said.
It is clarified that such a release order is not an acknowledgement that funds are from a legitimate source
“It is clarified that there is no acquittal of any sort as reported as there was no trial! funds were frozen by NCA and NCA has decided to not investigate these funds anymore,” the PM’s aide said.
He further said that Suleman Shehbaz is a fugitive in a money laundering case that is under trial at a court in Lahore, adding that Shehbaz Sharif also nominated in the case.
