Justice (retd) Shah Khawar appointed NAB's special prosecutor

ISLAMABAD: The National Accountability Bureau (NAB) has appointed Justice (retd) Shah Khawar as the bureau's special prosecutor, a press release said on Tuesday.

Khawar is a former judge of the Lahore High Court as well as a senior advocate of the Supreme Court. 

He has also served as the deputy attorney general and assistant advocate general. 

The special prosecutor will represent NAB in all important cases presently under way, including the Hudaibiya Paper Mills case. 

The Hudaibiya case is under way in the Supreme Court of Pakistan. 

On December 9, NAB requested the adjournment of the proceedings until a new prosecutor general is appointed at the bureau. 

The bureau had stated in a written request to the court that the Hudaibiya case is of a special nature and thus requires to be argued by the special prosecutor. 

The office of NAB prosecutor had been vacant since Waqas Qadeer Dar retired in November.

At the last hearing of the case on Monday (yesterday), the three-member apex court bench had dismissed NAB's request to adjourn the hearing until the special prosecutor's appointment. 

The apex court had also come down hard on the NAB request, stating that it has nothing to do with the appointment of prosecutors and the bureau should continue with its arguments regardless. 

The case, involving money laundering charges against the Sharif family, was initiated by NAB in 2000 but quashed by the Lahore High Court (LHC) in 2014. 

At present, NAB has filed an appeal in the Supreme Court against the LHC decision and requested it to quash the lower court's order and direct reinvestigation into the case.