Saving Pakistan from $1.2 bn penalty: Team awarded Sitara-e-Imtiaz for winning Karkey case

ISLAMABAD: A team comprising officers from the Pakistan Army whose efforts made the country proud internationally and saved the nation from a penalty of $1.2 billion has been awarded Sitara-i-Imtiaz.

The cabinet secretariat on Friday released the names of 184 Pakistani and foreign nationals who will be conferred civil awards for showing excellence and courage in their respective fields.

Brig Rana Arfan Shakeel Ramay, Lt Col Farooq Shahbaz and Ahmed Irfan Aslam worked hard in gathering information from Swiss, Lebanese, and Dubai banks regarding the corruption of Turkish power rental company Karkey.

The officials also collected documents from Panama and British Virgin Island which proved useful in winning the case against the firm. As a result of their fool-proof investigations, Karkey was forced to withdraw six cases it has filed against Pakistan, thus saving the nation from heavy penalties and international embarrassment.

The team, headed by Brig Ramay, would be conferred Sitara-i-Imtiaz for Public Service on March 23, 2021. The ICSID — an arm of the World Bank that offers arbitration and conciliation services for disputes between governments andprivate foreign investors — had slapped a penalty worth $760 million plus interest to the Turkish ship-based energy firm, Karkey Karadeniz Elektrik Uretim, following the latter's move to register arbitration claims against Pakistan under a bilateral investment treaty (BIT).

In September 2017, it had decided in favour of Karkey Karadeniz Elektrik Uretim and imposed a fine. The Turkish firm had registered a claim with the ICSID against Pakistan in 2013 over the violation of a contract worth as much as $564.6 million for a five-year period to build rental power plants in Karachi.