Good news about looted money soon: NAB chief

ISLAMABAD: The National Accountability Bureau (NAB) Chairman Justice (retd) Javed Iqbal on Tuesday said there will be a good news soon with regard to bringing back the looted money from abroad.

“The role of NAB is before all and what I talk about its performance. The NAB should be allowed to work as there will be no injustice with anyone,” he said in a brief press talk with media persons after attending a meeting of the Senate’s Functional Committee on Human Rights here at the Parliament House in which he gave a briefing on missing persons.

About his meeting with Chief Justice Saqib Nisar, the NAB chairman said the Supreme Court of Pakistan is his own institution and the meeting was pleasant. He said once the reference is filed in the accountability court, NAB’s role ends there.

About the Abbottabad Commission report, the NAB chairman, who was headed the commission, said that if the publication of the report came under his purview, then he could do it. Earlier, while briefing the Senate’s committee chaired by Mustafa Kokhar, Justice Javed Iqbal, who also headed the Commission of Inquiry on Enforced Disappearances, said the total number of cases was said to be 5,290 since 2011, while the number of cases disposed of till June 2018 is 3,462. He said 1,828 cases are still under investigation with the commission. He said the total cases of missing persons from Balochistan were 131 and most of the cases were related of kidnappings in personal enmities.

Justice Javed Iqbal said many people went abroad with Harbiyar Bugti and Brahamdagh Bugti and the names of these people were also included in the list of missing persons and even the names of those persons who were in Geneva were also not excluded from the list of missing persons.

“The name of those persons who have gone with Sufi Muhammad, Mangal Bagh and Mullah Fazlullah were also included in the list of missing persons,” he told the committee. He said two reports by Justice Mansoor Ali Khan and Justice Noor Muhammad will be of use to better analyse the problem of missing persons.

The chairman of the committee directed the Ministry of Interior to furnish both the reports before the committee and also directed the secretary interior to come to the next meeting and give his input on the two reports.

The committee agreed that whatever the reason of disappearances, the responsibility of recovery of citizens lies with the government. The committee also decided to take data from the Foreign Office regarding the number of Pakistanis in jails in different countries.

The committee directed the secretary general administration, Sindh, to sort out the issue of proper office building for the commission’s working in Sindh and give its compliance report to the committee. The committee will also visit the commission’s internment centres to observe the conditions for the inhabitants and also asked for the exact number of people currently in such centres.