Sharifs’ corruption trial: Court seeks another extension in deadline

ISLAMABAD: An accountability court hearing the remaining two corruption references against the Sharif family on Friday wrote a letter to the Supreme Court to seek another extension in the deadline to conclude the cases.

Accountability Court Judge Arshad Malik in his letter to the SC registrar wrote, “The trial against Nawaz Sharif in Al-Azizia and Flagship Investment references is near conclusion. It is not possible to complete the trial by the deadline given by the Supreme Court thus more time should be given.”

The letter further mentioned that the suspect is recording his statement in the Al-Azizia reference while arguments are being conducted on the last witness’s statement in the Flagship Investment reference.

The Supreme Court on October 12 granted the “final extension” to the accountability court to conclude the remaining two corruption references against the Sharif family.

Setting November 17 as the deadline for the accountability court to wrap up the Flagship Investment and Al-Azizia references, Justice Nisar had remarked that SC will not grant further extensions to conclude the trial.  

So far, six extensions to wrap up the corruption references initiated by the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) have been granted by the apex court.

The Supreme Court had initially set a six-month deadline to conclude the four corruption references against the Sharif family.

The trial

The trial against the Sharif family commenced on September 14, 2017.

On July 6, after four extensions in the original six-month deadline to conclude all three cases, the court announced its verdict in the Avenfield reference.

Nawaz and his sons, Hussain and Hasan, are accused in all three references whereas Maryam and Safdar were accused in the Avenfield reference only.

The two brothers, based abroad, have been absconding since the proceedings began last year and were declared proclaimed offenders by the court.