Husain Haqqani.—Online

ISLAMABAD: Former ambassador Husain Haqqani has submitted an application to the memo investigation commission, accusing the counsel for his accuser Mansoor Ijaz of making false allegations regarding threats to the life of his client.

Mr Haqqani said in the application submitted through his counsel Zahid Hussain Bukhari and Sajid Khan Tanoli on Friday that Mr Ijaz’s lawyer Akram Sheikh had claimed before the commission that he was receiving threats on email from him.

He said the claim was fabricated and intended to malign him and that threatening emails had neither been sent by him nor on his behalf to Mr Ijaz.

“I am a law-abiding citizen and this exercise is only to unnecessarily invoke my name and amounts to creating a false impression,” the applicant said. It requested the commission to take notice and issue an appropriate order on the matter.

It requested the commission to ask Advocate Sheikh not to make false and provocative statements about Mr Haqqani.

Advocate Tanoli said a similar application against Mr Sheikh had also been sent to the Pakistan Bar Council.

He claimed that Mr Ijaz would never come to Pakistan because he had nothing to substantiate his allegations against Mr Haqqani.

However, Advocate Sheikh denied that he had attributed the threats to Mr Haqqani.

“I still believe the government is trying to stop my client from attending the commission’s proceedings in Pakistan,” he said.

“Although the court has issued directives to provide army security to my client, I have reservations that the government is spying on him and it is possible that he may be kidnapped from airport before going into the immigration process,” he said.

He said the government was not implementing the orders of the Supreme Court in the NRO case, therefore, one could expect the same defiance with regard to the directives of the memo commission about not registering an FIR against his client.

He, however, said his client was willing to appear before the commission despite all odds.

In case the government succeeded in restricting Mr Ijaz, the commission had the powers and means to travel abroad to record his statement, the lawyer said.

According to sources, a request has been sent to the cabinet division by the commission’s secretary to arrange video-conferencing facilities in the courtroom where the proceedings are held.

In case a foreign witness could not appear before the commission, it might record his statement through video conferencing, they said.

Meanwhile, a petitioner, Advocate Tariq Asad, submitted the names of two witnesses before the commission.

The commission had asked all the parties in the case on Jan 9 to submit lists of their witnesses.

According to advocate Asad, his witnesses, former ISI director general Lt-Gen (retd) Javed Ashraf Qazi and former Intelligence Bureau chief Brig (retd) Imtiaz would brief the commission about the integrity of Mr Haqqani as well as other aspects of his personality.

In the application filed under the Legal Practitioners and Bar Council Act, Mr Haqqani requested the PBC to take disciplinary action against Advocate Sheikh and ask him not to attribute or make false, incorrect and provocative statements against the applicant.