Pak court quashes Sharif family's plea for week-long absence

Pakistan's accountability court on Thursday rejected the plea by former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and his daughter Maryam Nawaz for week-long exemption from personal appearance in the court.

According to the Dawn, accountability judge Mohammad Bashir quashed the applications filed by Sharif and Maryam. They had sought week-long exemption from appearance in court from March 26 to visit Sharif's wife Kulsoom Nawaz who, according to her medical report, may undergo a critical surgery in a London hospital in the next few days.

Following the dismissal of her plea, Maryam Nawaz tweeted, "She'd been waiting. Haven't seen her for over 4 months. Our last exemption request was also rejected."

"My mother was waiting for me and father, she asked on telephone whether permission was granted. I replied no. She went to say, it doesn't matter, Allah is with us," she said in a second tweet.

Reacting to their plea's dismissal, Pakistan's Minister of State (MoS) for Information and Broadcasting Marriyum Aurangzeb said the Sharif family had been subjected to victimisation in the name of accountability.

Earlier this month, the accountability court had allowed Sharif to leave the court after being told he was 'unwell'.

Last month, Supreme Court had disqualified Sharif from the post of ruling Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) party chief, saying all the decisions made by him as head of the party stand null and void.