Islamabad, Aug. 17 (TNS): A banking court in Karachi on Friday issued non-bailable warrants of arrest against PPP co-chairman and former president Asif Ali Zardari in the fake bank accounts scam case, Radio Pakistan reported.
The court also issued non-bailable arrest warrants against other absconding suspects, including Nasser Abdullah Lootah, Aslam Masood, Nimr Majeed, Arif Khan, Adnan Javed, Mohammad Umair, Mohammad Iqbal Arain, Azam Wazir Khan, Zain Malik and Mustafa Zulqernain.
While hearing the case relating to the money laundering probe, the court directed authorities to arrest and present Zardari and other suspects before it by September 4.
However, PPP spokesperson Farhatullah Babar issued a statement in which he quoted Zardari’s counsel Farooq H. Naek as saying that no warrants against the former president have been issued.
The Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) had declared Zardari and his sister Faryal Talpur, along with 18 other suspects, as absconders in an interim charge sheet filed in the case. Talpur had, however, obtained a bail against her arrest.
The fake accounts case revolves around a 2015 inquiry into suspicious transactions when 29 ‘benami’ accounts were identified, 16 of them in the Summit Bank, eight in the Sindh Bank and five in the United Bank Limited.
