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How Calibri font 'exposed' Sharif’s daughter

Maryam Nawaz.   | Photo Credit: Reuters

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The Joint Investigation Team alleges that documents submitted by Maryam Nawaz in the Panama Papers case are fake.

Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif’s daughter Maryam Nawaz submitted fake documents and misled the Supreme Court, the joint investigation team set up by the court has alleged.

The JIT sent what was presented by Ms. Maryam as “original documents” to the Radley Forensic Document Laboratory in London for examination. After the forensic examination, the laboratory’s expert, Robert W. Radley, stated that he identified the type font used to produce both as ‘Calibri’.

“However, Calibri was not commercially available before 31st January 2007 and as such, neither of the originals of the certified declarations is correctly dated and happened to have been created at some later point in time,” the Express Tribune quoted Mr. Radley as saying.

Ms. Maryam had rejected the report, saying, “JIT report REJECTED. Every contradiction will not only be contested but decimated in SC. NOT a penny of public exchequer involved.”

Ms. Maryam, 43, is being groomed to succeed her father and the charges may seriously impede her ambitions.

However, her fate is closely tied with that of her father who along with the two sons and daughter may face a formal corruption case.

Last year, the Panama Papers revealed that three of Mr. Sharif’s children owned offshore companies and assets not shown on his family’s wealth statement. The assets in question include four expensive flats in Park Lane, London.

The JIT was set up in May by the Supreme Court with the mandate to probe the Sharif family for allegedly failing to provide the trail of money used to buy properties in London in 1990s.

Printable version | Jul 15, 2017 4:48:22 AM | http://www.thehindu.com/news/international/wrong-font-exposed-sharifs-daughter-jit/article19263047.ece