LAHORE: A local accountability court Saturday acquitted former prime minister Shehbaz Sharif and nine others of all the charges in the Aashiana Iqbal reference.
Announcing the reserved verdict, the court accepted the application for acquittal filed by 10 suspects, including Shehbaz Sharif, Ahad Cheema and Fawad Hassan Fawad.
Other suspects included Imtiaz Haider, Munir Zia, Shahid Shafiq, Bilal Kidwai, Shahid Mahmood, Ali Sajjad Bhutta and Muhammad Sadiq. The court has previously already acquitted Kamran Kiani and Nadeem Zia in the case.
Earlier on Saturday, the court had reserved its verdict after hearing arguments from lawyers of both sides. During the hearing of the acquittal applications, the attorney general and the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) submitted their reports. The NAB prosecutor and the attorney general told the court that the apex court verdict did not impact the case at hand.
Earlier, the court had sought assistance on the point of the Supreme Court stopping from announcing any decision on all the NAB cases. The reference was filed against the suspects in 2018. Shahbaz Sharif and others were accused of causing loss to the national exchequer by awarding a contract to a single company.
