Shehbaz Sharif sues UK’s Mail on Sunday for ‘politically motivated’ report

Shehbaz Sharif, brother of ex-prime minister Nawaz Sharif, and leader of Pakistan Muslim League - Nawaz (PML-N), leaves after attending the oath taking ceremony of the newly elected members of the National Assembly (Lower House of Parliament) at the Parliament house in Islamabad, Pakistan August 13, 2018. (REUTERS)

• Will be represented by Carter-Ruck, one of Britain’s best law firms in the fields of litigation and dispute resolution
• British tabloid report on July 14 alleged Sharif had embezzled funds meant for victims of a 2005 earthquake

ISLAMABAD: Pakistani opposition leader Shehbaz Sharif has sent a legal notice to British newspaper The Mail on Sunday and online news site Mail Online for publishing a “politically motivated” article against him alleging he had embezzled funds meant for earthquake victims, the law firm hired to pursue the case has said. 
British tabloid Mail on Sunday said in a July 14 article that Sharif, the president of the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz party, had embezzled funds provided by UK’s Department for International Development (DFID) for rehabilitation and reconstruction work after a devastating 2005 earthquake. 
Carter-Ruck, a British law firm whose lawyers rank in the top tier of media, defamation and privacy lawyers in the United Kingdom, said in a statement quoted on Pakistani media that it would be representing Sharif.
“The article is gravely defamatory of Mr. Sharif, including false allegations that he misappropriated UK taxpayers’ money in the form of DFID aid intended for the victims of the devastating 2005 earthquake in Pakistan,” the firm’s statement said. “Mr. Sharif denies these allegations in the strongest possible terms.”
Sharif, who was the chief minister of Pakistan’s richest and most populous province of Punjab when the earthquake took place, said he was appalled to read the report that he “stole money from a fund for earthquake victims.”
“This appears to be yet another politically motivated campaign against me and my family by the current government of Pakistan,” Sharif said in a statement. “According to the article, it granted the journalist ‘exclusive access to some of the results of a high-level probe ordered by Khan’ including a ‘confidential investigation report’ and highly unusual access to ‘interview key witnesses held on remand in jail’.”
DFID has also rejected the contents of the article and said in a statement on July 14: “The UK’s financial support to ERRA [Earthquake Reconstruction and Rehabilitation Authority] over this period was for payment by results – which means we only gave money once the agreed work, which was primarily focused on building schools, was completed, and the work audited and verified.”
Sharif, who is currently the leader of the opposition in the National Assembly, faces a range of cases being investigated by the National Accountability Bureau, including one involving alleged corruption in a low-cost housing scheme called Aashyana, when Sharif was chief minister of Punjab province. He was arrested in the case last October but is currently out on bail.
Sharif is the brother of ousted Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif who is serving a seven-year-sentence for graft. Nawaz Sharif has denounced corruption cases against him and his party’s leaders as politically motivated, and both brothers deny any wrongdoing.