DATE=5/11/2000
TYPE=BACKGROUND REPORT
TITLE=PAK / SHARIF CORRUPTION TRIAL
NUMBER=5-46293
BYLINE=SCOTT ANGER
DATELINE=ISLAMABAD
CONTENT=
VOICED AT:
INTRO: Pakistan's former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif
is scheduled to face charges of corruption in court
proceedings opening Friday in a 16th Century fort near
the capital. From Islamabad, Correspondent Scott
Anger reports the new trial comes about a month after
Sharif was sentenced to two concurrent life terms on
charges of hijacking and terrorism.
TEXT: The new trial will be the first of three trials
involving Pakistan's former Prime Minister Nawaz
Sharif on charges that he used his political influence
to amass millions of dollars of wealth.
Friday, a judge is expected to read a charge sheet
which will outline a case involving Mr. Sharif's
purchase of a helicopter he used during an election
campaign in 1997. Anti-corruption officials with the
military government's National Accountability Bureau
say the former prime minister purchased the Russian-
made helicopter but failed to declare it among his
assets.
Prosecutors say Sharif used the aircraft to visit
remote areas of the country during his bid to be
elected prime minister.
Farouk Adam Khan -- prosecutor general for Pakistan's
National Accountability Bureau -- says the helicopter
case may not be the most important act of corruption
Nawaz Sharif committed while holding public office.
///KHAN ACTUALITY///
It may not prove to be the principal act of corruption
which we will finally find. Many other investigations
are going on. It is a joint (Sharif) family system
they have built up over the past few years while they
were holding political office. It is probably one of
the greatest industrial empires in Asia. It is a huge
industrial empire and, as we believe, has been built
up primarily on the proceeds of crime.
///END ACTUALITY///
The trial is being held at Attock Fort -- a 16th
Century stronghold overlooking the Indus River, about
80 kilometers northwest of Islamabad.
Officials within Nawaz Sharif's political party -- the
Pakistan Muslim League -- have accused the military
government of turning the fort into a torture center
and have compared it to a concentration camp. Attock
Fort has been used in the past as a detention facility
by previous military governments.
Why hold civilian trials at a military fort? Mr. Khan
explains:
///KHAN ACTUALITY///
Security! Security of not only the accused but
security of the judges, security of the witnesses,
security of the lawyers, both defense and prosecution.
The opposition has gone out of the way in trying to
depict Attock Fort as a place of detention or a
concentration camp. It's not so. It is just a place
which we feel, under the circumstances, would be best
suited to carry out a safe, secure and a fair trial.
///END ACTUALITY///
The prosecutor general says his office has received
intelligence reports indicating a plot to harm Mr.
Sharif may be under way. As a result, he says he does
not want to take any chances -- especially after a
defense lawyer for Nawaz Sharif was gunned down in his
Karachi office during the former prime minister's
hijacking trial in March. No one has been arrested
in the case and it is not known whether the murder was
connected to Mr. Sharif's earlier trial.
The ousted prime minister is expected to be busy with
court cases for some time. He was sentenced last
month to two life terms in prison after being
convicted of hijacking and terrorism. A court in
Karachi, where the trial took place, has set May 22nd
to begin hearing Nawaz Sharif's appeal against his
conviction for diverting a passenger plane carrying
army chief General Pervez Musharraf last October.
Mr. Khan outlines the maximum sentences the former
prime minister could receive if he is convicted of the
charges in the trial beginning Friday.
///KHAN ACTUALITY///
It stretches from a maximum of 14 years rigorous
imprisonment and confiscation of property -- along
with -- which is almost a mandatory thing as far as we
are concerned, is a disqualification from holding
elected office or seeking public or political office
for a period which may extend up to 21 years.
///END ACTUALITY///
As in the earlier trial, the decision of guilt or
innocence in the corruption trial lies solely with the
judge in the case.
Nawaz Sharif has denied all the charges which have
been levied against him since he was ousted from power
in a bloodless military coup October 12th. He says
Pakistan's military leader General Pervez Musharraf is
carrying out a personal vendetta.
Most people in Pakistan believe the country's former
leaders have been involved in some level of
corruption. Former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto was
convicted of misrule last year and is now living in
exile. She faces arrest if she returns to Pakistan.
The poor South Asia nation has been borrowing money
for years from international lending institutions, but
has little to show for it. Pakistan's foreign debt is
about 38 billion dollars and most of the country's 140
million people live in poverty. A majority of the
population does not have access to clean drinking
water or education. (SIGNED)
NEB/SA/WD
11-May-2000 07:16 AM EDT (11-May-2000 1116 UTC)
NNNN
Source: Voice of America
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