Avenfield reference: Property papers now made part of court record

ISLAMABAD: Joint Investigation Team (JIT) head Wajid Zia resumed recording his statement with the Accountability Court on Friday and shared more documents with the judge in Avenfield Apartment’s corruption reference.

Wajid produced the original letter of Sheikh Hammad Bin Jasim Khalifa Al-Thani that was submitted to the Supreme Court during the Panama case hearing.

Surprisingly, it was quite different from the letter of Al-Thani that Zia had submitted to the court on March 15.

Legal counsel for Nawaz Sharif, Maryam Nawaz and Captain (R) Muhammad Safdar, Khawaja Haris Ahmed and Amjad Pervez advocates raised objections to the fresh letter saying it was not admissible being not part of the record.

Sustaining the objection, Judge Muhammad Bashir directed Zia that if he wanted to submit a letter as new evidence he should file an application and then the court would decide whether or not it was admissible.

Wajid Zia and the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) prosecution then took the letter back.

Wajid Zia submitted many documents to the court. The defense counsel raised objections saying many documents were either photocopies or photocopies of photocopies.