LONDON — British tabloid Daily Mail has submitted its defence to Shehbaz Sharif’s defamation case at the UK High Court, relying completely on the National Accountability (NAB) reference against the former Punjab chief minister.
All the names, allegations and evidence are similar in nature and content to what the NAB Reference constitutes. The ANL submitted its defence two weeks after Westminster Magistrates’ Court ordered release of bundle of National Crime Agency investigation into the Pakistani politician, demonstrating that money-laundering and criminal conduct was not proven against Shehbaz Sharif and his son Suleman Sharif during two years’ long investigation over the same allegations on which the NCA relied while obtaining Assets Freezing Orders (AFO) from the court in the end of 2019 and that form the core of NAB Reference.
In the Mail on Sunday, it was alleged on 14 July 2019 that Sharif and his son-in-law were involved in money-laundering and stealing UK aid to Pakistan. The UK aid immediately issued a rebuttal stating that its money was not stolen and Sharif and Yousuf announced to launch defamation cases against the publisher and the reporter. Around a year ago, Justice Nicklin at London High Court determined that the allegations carried Chase Level 1 meaning and the paper must produce evidence. The Mail took around five extensions and cited Covid restrictions as the reasons for delay in submission of evidence.
The ANL evidence starts with discussing Shehbaz Sharif’s role as Chief Minister of Punjab and the executive authority he held. over the Government of Punjab and its resources.
Sticking to its original publication, the Mail evidence says during “his period as Chief Minister of Punjab between 2008 and 2018, tens of millions of pounds of laundered funds were received into bank accounts owned, operated and/or controlled by” Sharif and his family through their agents, companies or associates. It names Nusrat Shahbaz Sharif; Hamza Shahbaz Sharif; Suleman Shahbaz Sharif; Rabia Imran; Javeria Ali and Tehmina Durrani.
The defence says that a key individual in implementing the flow of these funds was Fazal Dad Abbasi, who has served since 1991 as an employee of the Sharif Group of Companies, and allegedly regularly distributed large sums of cash from the premises of a property owned by the Sharif Group at 55-K Model Town, Lahore, “in order to conceal the original source of the said funds”.
The ANL defences refers to Shehbaz Sharif’s purchase of four London properties with help from PTI donor Aneel Mussarat and alleges that “such mortgages would not have been maintainable by reference to the Claimant’s legitimate sources of income”. It raises questions about Shehbaz Sharif’s decision to transfer the proceeds of the sale of Flat 2, 30 Upper Berkeley Street, London, to give sale proceeds to Suleman Sharif.
