Nawaz-Zardari meeting was never scheduled: PPP sources

LONDON: The Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) sources in London on Wednesday said that a meeting between Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and Asif Ali Zardari was never scheduled.

“Asif Ali Zardari is in London with his aides but no meeting with PM Nawaz has been requested or planned till now,” sources said.

“Asif Ali Zardari can meet anyone he wishes to and he has always encouraged reconciliation and dialogue.”

Addressing a press conference in Islamabad earlier today, Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan, too, rubbished rumours circling in the media that PM Nawaz was travelling to London for a medical check-up or to meet somebody.

“Prime Minister Nawaz is in London for medical treatment,” Nisar told reporters. “As soon as the doctors will advise him (the premier) to return to Pakistan, he will be back,” he said.

Nisar was critical of opposition parties who were terming the prime minister’s visit to the United Kingdom to have anything to do with the Panama Papers’ revelations.

Leaked confidential documents spanning over nearly 40 years that spell out the extensive use of tax havens by politicians, world leaders and celebrities to launder money and evade taxes through one of the most secretive companies the Panamaian law firm Mossack Fonseca has taken the world by storm.

Many Pakistanis have also been named in their revelations.

The documents identify many Pakistani business tycoons and politicians including late two-time Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto as well certain members of the ruling Sharif family (excluding PM Nawaz Sharif and his brother Chief Minister of Punjab Shahbaz Sharif) to have use tax havens to hide their wealth.