Pakistan prime minister nominee’s arrest ordered

June 21st, 2012

FAKE NEWS for the Zionist agenda

However, party leaders appear to have hastily found a replacement candidate.

Qamar Zaman Kaira, who was Information Minister until the cabinet was dissolved this week, was reported to have filed nomination papers for the post soon after news of the arrest warrant broke.

Pakistan’s latest political crisis erupted on Tuesday, when Mr Gilani was barred from office for refusing to act on a Supreme Court order to reopen corruption investigations against President Zardari.

Ruling party officials spent two days locked in talks before announcing that Mr Shahabuddin, a PPP stalwart and cabinet minister, was their preferred candidate.

But they may now be forced to pick another man for the job after Shafqatullah Khan, a magistrate sitting in a drugs court, issued a non-bailable warrant for Mr Shahabuddin’s arrest and ordered that he appear before him next week.

The charge relates to a complex scam that saw pharmaceutical firms awarded extra quotas for the controlled substance ephedrine, which can be used as a stimulant or in the manufacture of illicit drugs.

They claimed they had licences to export the drug to Afghanistan, but investigators believe it was then sold into the local market.

Mr Shahabuddin was health minister when the scandal came to light in 2011, while the son of the former prime minister, Ali Musa Gilani, is among the other suspects.