ISLAMABAD: The National Accountability Bureau (NAB) has ordered an inquiry against former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif for allegedly laundering US$4.9 billion to India.
The NAB Chairman took notice of media reports that highlighted the alleged laundering.
These reports claimed that the laundering incident had been mentioned in the World Bank’s 2016 Migration and Remittance Book.
Further statements claim that this money was laundered to the Indian finance ministry which subsequently led to India’s foreign reserves increasing, while Pakistan concomitantly suffered.
The State Bank of Pakistan, however, had rejected these claims in a press release dated 21st September 2016. The Bank claimed that the World Bank’s methodology of calculating bilateral remittance flows was faulty as was acknowledged by the creators of this methodology.
Pakistan’s central bank further argued that this methodology labelled Pakistanis living in India after partition as ‘migrants’, thus resulting in a bloated figure for remittances.
The bank also claimed that remittances from Pakistan to India numbered US$116,000 in 2016, while remittances from India to Pakistan in the same period totalled US$329,000.