PTI chief Imran Khan has informed the national-graft buster’s Rawalpindi office that he himself did not read the summary approved by the cabinet.

“I did not read that summary myself in detail, [the-then adviser to the PM on accountability] Shahzad Akbar briefed me orally,” he said in response to a query from NAB officials.

He appeared before the national-graft buster’s Rawalpindi office in a case pertaining to the £190 million NCA scandal, which was previously known as the Al-Qadir Trust case, investigation.

Khan added that he approved the summary on the advice of Akbar. “If the cabinet does not approve, then we will file a case in the London court. It was told that if we file a case, we will have to pay millions of rupees,” he said.

The National Accountability Bureau has made Khan a party in the case. The anti-graft body has sought responses from Khan on 20 questions related to the alleged transfer of “illegal money”, sources told Aaj News.

NAB has asked the former prime minister to submit details of assets.

The PTI chief faced questions from a combined investigation team at NAB’s Rawalpindi office for over an hour on Tuesday.

Sources said Khan told the investigation team that he is not in control of the record about the transfer of £190 million from the UK to Pakistan. The record is with the cabinet division while I don’t have access to the NCA record over the issue, Khan was quoted as saying by the sources.

The former prime minister also said that NAB was already in possession of the record about the Al Qadir Trust, which Khan founded with his wife Bushra Bibi, and other PTI leaders.

The government and the NAB claim that Khan and Bushra Bibi used Al Qadir Trust for receiving Rs6 billion worth of land from property tycoon Malik Riaz Hussain of Bahria Town. In return, the Khan government granted approval for the transfer of £190 million to a Supreme Court of Pakistan account where Riaz was to deposit a huge sum of money to pay a fine that the top court had imposed in a ruling.

Meanwhile, PML-N leader Attaullah Tarar claimed that the PTI chief was not cooperating with the NAB team. “Imran Khan is not submitting the records called for by the court,” he said at a press conference.

He claimed that the former premier approved the letter without showing it to the cabinet. “£190 million was returned to be spent on the public. The money brought back from abroad was not deposited in the national exchequer,” said Tarar.

Tarar, who is special assistant to the PM on interior Attaullah Tarar, alleged that 458 kanals of land were given to Imran Khan as a bribe in return for this bribe.

“The documents of Al-Qadir Trust are signed by Imran’s wife and Farah Gogi. Government and military properties were burnt to hide corruption. Propaganda is being done to rob the country of billions of rupees,” he said.

More to follow…