Thaindian News

Islamabad, Jan 9 (IANS) Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) chief Nawaz Sharif said Monday if required he would present himself again before the judicial commission probing the memo scandal, as his party respected the judiciary.

Having appeared before the judicial commission which is collecting evidence in the memo scandal, Sharif told reporters that he had not levelled charges against anyone, the daily Dawn reported.

“I am a petitioner and showed respect by appearing before the commission,” said Nawaz while accusing the Parliamentary Committee on National Security (PCNS), which is separately probing the memo scandal, of having done nothing on the issue so far, the Geo News reported.

“I have not named Haqqani or Zardari, just pleaded for investigation into the matter,” the report quoted Sharif as saying.

“All we want is an investigation of the issue so that facts could be ascertained and established before the public,” Sharif said.

He also said that President Asif Ali Zardari’s recent statement in a television interview reflected his lack of faith in the country’s judiciary.

Pakistani-American businessman Mansoor Ijaz claims to have handed over a memo to the then US military chief Gen. Mike Mullen at the behest of the then Pakistan ambassador to the US, Husain Haqqani, and the government to avert a likely military coup which President Zardari feared following Al Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden’s May 2 killing at Abbottabad near Islamabad.

Pakistan’s Supreme Court set up a three-member commission to investigate the scandalous memo issue.

Regarding the money in Swiss banks, the former prime minister said that “wealth belongs to the people and it should be brought back at all costs”.

He urged the government to implement the Supreme Court’s order regarding the National Reconciliation Ordinance (NRO) and write a letter to Swiss authorities.