KARACHI – The Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) director general (DG) Waseem Ahmed appeared before Justice Sajjad Ali Shah of the Sindh High Court (SHC) on Friday to record his statement on the acquittal of the accused in the Khanani and Kalia money laundering case.
The FIA DG was directed on March 9 to appear the judge and bring all evidence and record to back his statement before a senate committee and the media following the acquittal of eight men in the famous foreign exchange scam case by a banking court.
After having his statement recorded, the FIA DG told the media that he respects the judiciary and could not even think about saying anything in contempt of court, adding that he had a liable statement recorded that is confidential and could not be shared with the media.
SHC Chief Justice Mushir Alam had assigned Justice Shah to conduct an inquiry over the acquittal of the accused in the money laundering case and submit a report within a week. The SHC CJ had taken the initiative on the directives of Chief Justice of Pakistan Justice Iftkhar Muhammad Chaudhry, who took suo motu notice after the FIA DG raised questions over the acquittal of the accused in the Khanani and Kalia case.
On March 4, a special banking court exonerated four foreign exchange dealers and as many officials of different banks from all charges of falsification of bank accounts for the purpose of money laundering.
The four forex dealers – Abdul Munaf Kalia, his brother Hanif Kalia, Javed Khanani and Atif Polani – were accused of opening bogus bank accounts with the help of bankers Masood Abbas, Syed Wajahat Ali, Tasleem Ahmed and Arif-ur-Rehman and allegedly using them for unlawful transfer of billions of dollars abroad.
