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: JURIST - The Paper Chase

Pakistan high court releases detailed judgment on presidential amnesty order

By Bernard Hibbitts (editor) and University of Pittsburgh School of Law students.

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[JURIST] The Supreme Court of Pakistan released its detailed judgment regarding the controversial National Reconciliation Ordinance (NRO) on Wednesday. The ordinance granted President Asif Ali Zardari and 8,000 other government officials immunity from charges including corruption, embezzlement, money laundering, murder, and terrorism between January 1986, and October 1999. A special 17-member panel of court unanimously ruled the NRO unconstitutional in December, paving the way for corruption charges to be brought against Zardari. Zardari is immune from prosecution while in office, but challenges to his eligibility as a presidential candidate are expected. Many other government officials could face immediate prosecution. Last month, a Pakistani court issued an arrest warrant for Interior Minister Rehman Malik on corruption charges. Malik is among 19 officials whose corruption cases the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) has petitioned to reopen in an anti-corruption court in Rawalpindi. The NAB has also petitioned a Lahore court to reopen the cases of 32 individuals, including that of Defense Minister Chaudhry Ahmed Mukhtar. The NRO was signed by former Pakistani president Pervez Musharraf in 2007 as part of a power-sharing accord allowing former Pakistani prime minister Benazir Bhutto to return to the country despite corruption charges she had faced.

Full post as published by JURIST - The Paper Chase on January 20, 2010 (boomark / email).