VIDEO: Here’s what happened when Shahzad Akbar reached Pakistan High Commission for NAB inquiry

Former prime minister (PM) Imran Khan’s special assistant on accountability Mirza Shahzad Akbar on Thursday visited the Pakistan High Commission (PHC) in London’s Knightsbridge to seek permission for attending the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) inquiries against him via video link.

The PHC, however, reportedly refused to let him in.

Speaking to journalist Murtaza Ali Shah outside the high commission, Akbar alleged that the accountability watchdog was intentionally preventing him from appearing in the multiple investigations against him.

“There is a clear, known and established political motivation behind these cases against me, yet I am offering to join the investigation via video link from the United Kingdom [UK]. I have offered to do so from the Pakistan High Commission in London as well, but there has been no response. Instead, I was responded to with media trials. There is a clear threat to my life and liberty,” the former head of the Asset Recovery Unit (ARU) said.

Akbar said he had filed the writ petition with the Islamabad High Court regarding the Al-Qadir Trust case a long time ago and NAB was adamant on an in-person inquiry rather than video link. “I was summoned again in person on February 6, 2025, in Islamabad as another attempt to harass me. I have come here to stress again that I am available for a video-link interview and happy to provide any legally sought documents.”

The ex-ARU head maintained that there was precedent available where several people appeared before probe teams via video-link. “In the Memogate scandal, Hussain Haqqani [former Pakistan ambassador to the US] and Mansoor Ijaz appeared from London via video link to present their defence. I want the same facility,” he said.

On being asked about his government denying requests by Mian Saleem Raza and Nasir Butt to appear before NAB in Judge Arshad Malik’s video case via video link, Akbar said the decisions back then were made “elsewhere”.

“I have sympathy for Mian Saleem Raza and Nasir Mahmood. The difference is they didn’t name who was behind the cases against them… I and many others in PTI have named the people behind these cases,” he said, noting that “those filing cases against PML-N back then were now doing the same against the PTI”.

“There is a lesson in it for the politicians to come together and work towards the supremacy of Pakistan’s Constitution,” he said.