UK paper accuses Shehbaz Sharif of stealing DFID aid

LONDON: UK’s Daily Mail newspaper has accused former Punjab chief minister Shehbaz Sharif of ‘embezzling tens of millions of pounds of public money and laundering it in Britain’.Quoting Pakistani investigators, the report said ‘some of the allegedly stolen money came from DFID-funded aid projects’.The report, titled “Did the family of Pakistani politician who has become the poster boy for British overseas aid STEAL funds meant for earthquake victims, asks DAVID ROSE”, said the newspaper was given exclusive access to “some of the results of a high-level probe ordered by Prime Minister Imran Khan”.Daily Mail also claimed to have interviewed ‘key witnesses held on remand in jail, including a UK citizen Aftab Mehmood’.“He claims he laundered millions on behalf of Shahbaz’s family from a nondescript office in Birmingham – without attracting suspicion from Britain’s financial regulators, who inspected his books regularly.”The Sharif family, however, denied the allegations levelled in the report.Shahbaz’s son Suleman termed these allegations “product of a ‘political witch-hunt’ ordered by the Pakistani government”. ‘No allegation has been proven. There is no evidence of kickbacks,’ he said.Former minister and senior PML-N leader Ahsan Iqbal termed the report a 'pack of lies' and 'paid'. Talking to media, Iqbal said Daily Mail is not a reliable source of information and even Wikipedia does not cite the newspaper.