Islamabad: The Supreme Court of Pakistan raised objection over the draft letter — presented by the government before the apex court — to be sent to Swiss authorities to reopen graft cases against President Asif Ali Zardari.
A five-member bench comprising Justice Asif Saeed Khan Khosa, Justice Ejaz Afzal Khan, Justice Ijaz Ahmed Chaudhry, Justice Gulzar Ahmed and Justice Athar Saeed resumed the hearing of the National Reconciliation Ordinance (NRO) implementation case on Tuesday.
During the hearing, Federal Law Minister Farooq H Naek presented his authority papers and the draft of the letter to be sent to the Swiss authorities before the court.
The bench raised objection over few clauses of the letter and noted that there was a difference between reference numbers written on Naek’s letter and the one on Attorney General Malik Qayyum’s letter written in 2008.
During previous hearing of the case, Pakistan’s prime minister told the Supreme Court that the government would comply with a longstanding demand to reopen an old corruption case against the president, defusing a conflict that has roiled the country’s political system and led to the ouster of the last premier.
Pakistan was originally a civil party to the case because it was trying to reclaim the money. But it withdrew in 2008 after the Pakistani government issued an ordinance giving Zardari and other politicians immunity from prosecution in old corruption cases.
The SC declared the ordinance unconstitutional in 2009 and demanded the government write a letter to the Swiss to reopen the case, but it refused, citing the president’s immunity from prosecution while in office.
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