Suleman Shehbaz, the son of Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, was cleared on Saturday by the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA), which cited a “lack of evidence” in the Rs16 billion sugar scam case. In a challan issued to the special court in Lahore, which heard Suleman’s application for bail in the case, the FIA absolved the Prime Minister’s son of all charges.
Suleman, who returned to Pakistan on December 11 following a four-year self-imposed exile in London, was named in an assets-beyond-means investigation by the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) and accused of money laundering in Rs. 16 billion cases.
In all situations, he has been deemed a proclaimed offender. The NAB and FIA were prohibited from detaining him before his return by an order from the Islamabad High Court (IHC). Suleman’s attorney Amjad Parvez was with him today as they attended the court.
The FIA presented a challan to the court as the proceedings got underway, claiming the organization could not discover any evidence against Suleman in the case it had been looking into for months. Suleman and another co-accused, Tahir Naqvi, withdrew their bail requests after the FIA’s filing. The hearing was postponed until February 4th.
PM Shehbaz and his older son, Hamza Shehbaz, were cleared of all charges in this case by a special court in Lahore a few months prior. Shehbaz and his two sons, Suleman and Hamza, were detained by the FIA in November 2020 in accordance with sections 419, 420, 468, 471, 34, and 109 of the Prevention of Corruption Act, as well as section 3/4 of the Anti-Money Laundering Act. For their regular absences from hearings, Suleman and another co-suspect had been labeled as offenders by the court.
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