FIA wants to arrest PM, CM Hamza in money laundering case,

LAHORE:The Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) on Saturday informed a special court in Lahore that the agency wanted to arrest Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif and his son CM Hamza Shahbaz in the Rs16 billion money laundering case.

“As it is mentioned in the challan, we do require their arrest for further investigation,” said the FIA prosecutor who was responding to a query put forth by the special central court judge on whether the agency requires the arrests of the accused in the money laundering case.

The premier and chief minister were present in the courtroom at this time.

As proceedings commenced, Pakistan Muslims League-Nawaz (PMLN) counsel Amjad Pervez expressed to the court that the case was politically motivated, where party leaders were implicated in a forged case.

Pervez stated that the accused could not be tried for similar cases in two different courts, according to legal precedent, as another money laundering case was filed by the National Accountability Bureau (NAB).

The counsel further said that the FIA could not urge for the arrests of the prime minister and the chief minister as the challan had already been filed.

Pervez added that a suspect, ‘Mushtaq’ was neither made witness nor formally accused in the case yet the FIA claimed he had been investigated.

“The accused persons, when they were in jail, were investigated by the FIA. The previous government used all the state’s machinery against the accused when they were opposition leaders,” Pervez argued.

Meanwhile, with the consent of the court, the PM and the CM left the courtroom.