Money laundering charges against MQM dropped for political reasons, British journalist claims

Money laundering charges against Muttahida Qaumi Movement founder could have been dropped for political reasons, British journalist Owen Bennett Jones who has followed the case closely said in an interview with BBC Urdu on Friday.

“Two senior leaders of the MQM confessed to the London police that India had funded them. There statements were recorded with the police. Police gave their case to the Crown Prosecution Service which faced international pressure and thought it is better to drop the case in view of public interest,” he said.

He called this development a victory for MQM. “It’s a big victory for MQM. It is an important turn in the several year long investigation. Money laundering was an important aspect of the murder case. It was thought that [amid the pressure] MQM will split.”

The London police, he said, raided that MQM founder’s house to probe the Imran Farooq murder case. But they instead found a huge amount of money and list of weapons in his house, which triggered the money laundering investigation.

Scotland Yard announced on Thursday that no “further action will be taken against Altaf Hussain” and others in the long-running money-laundering case, deciding to drop the investigation altogether and effectively ensuring that the sensitive evidence involved in this case doesn’t go to public for fear of causing rifts between Pakistan, the UK and India.

The case against the Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) Chief Altaf Hussain started in the end of 2012 when the police found a large amount of cash at the MQM’s International Secretariat. Scotland Yard said during the course of investigation that it had “credible evidence that the MQM received funds from the Indian government sources and broke the electoral laws of Pakistan and the UK”.