AC to hear Park Lane case filed against Zardari on March 25

ISLAMABAD: An accountability court to hear the Park Lane case filed against former president Asif Ali Zardari on 25th March.

AC Judge Arshad Malik conducted the hearing today which Asif Ali Zardari skipped due to his health condition. He had already sought exemption from the court appearance on the medical grounds.

Except Zardari, the other co-accused of the case arrived before the court and marked their attendance.  All the accused were directed to ensure their presence on the next hearing that will be heard on 25th March.

Zardari has been booked by the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) in which the bureau claimed that he has been allegedly running a fake front company by the name of Parathon as a shareholder in Park Lane properties.

Also, a loan worth Rs 1.5 billion was taken out from the bank and transferred to the company account in a private bank.

According to the NAB, Zardari forged documents to comply with the loan policy.

Earlier NAB filed a new reference against Zardari in fake accounts case.  The owners of the OMNI group, Khawaja Anwar Majeed and his son Khawaja Ghani Majeed were also named as suspects in reference.

The reference has been filed at the Accountability Court in Islamabad. The reference stated that in order to extend the illegal benefit to the accused, Zardari allowed the retention of vehicles gifted to them by different foreign states by relaxing procedures relating to the submission of gifts in the Toshakhana.

However, the NAB had requested the court to conduct a trial and sentence the accused to the strictest possible jail terms under the NAB Ordinance for their involvement in the corruption scam.