The National Accountability Bureau (NAB) on Friday challenged in the Lahore High Court (LHC) the decision by an accountability court clearing Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and his family of corruption charges in two references.
Last month, Rawalpindi Accountability Judge Anwar Ahmed had rejected an application filed in 2011 by the accountability watchdog to revive the Hudaibiya Paper Mills and Raiwind Assets references against the Sharifs.
NAB has now requested the LHC to reopen the corruption references against the Sharif family.
In Oct 2011, a Rawalpindi Bench of the LHC had restrained the accountability court from proceedings in the matter after Sharif and members of his family challenged the revival of the references and requested the court to quash the cases.
The petitioners included Sharif, his brother Abbas Sharif, their mother Shamim Akhtar, Hussain Nawaz, Hamza Shahbaz, Sabiha Abbas, Maryam Safdar and Syed Ajmal Sibtain, the secretary of the Hudaibiya Paper Mills.
In May this year, the LHC had accepted the petition requesting the court to quash the Hudaibiya Paper Mills and Raiwind Assets references.
The court had observed that NAB had not given proper opportunity to the Sharif family to join the investigations and justify their assets.
As per the NAB investigation report in the Hudaibiya Paper Mills reference, the Sharif family had allegedly deposited ill-gotten money in bank accounts opened in other people’s names and used it to pay off loans of their companies.