GENEVA, Dec 28: Swiss authorities have closed an investigation into the late Benazir Bhutto for alleged money laundering but a parallel probe into her husband’s activities continues, her lawyer said on Friday.
The opposition leader was assassinated on Thursday in Rawalpindi while campaigning for upcoming elections.
A three-year investigation into allegations that Ms Bhutto used Swiss banks to launder millions of dollars in kickbacks has been closed, lawyer Alec Reymond said on Friday -- charges Ms Bhutto steadfastly denied, calling the corruption claims politically motivated.However, Reymond said proceedings would continue against Bhutto’s husband, Asif Ali Zardari, and another unnamed individual. Geneva’s chief prosecutor, Daniel Zappelli, could not be reached for comment on Friday.
In 1998, Swiss authorities said they found 20 million Swiss francs (then about $13.80 million) in Swiss accounts belonging to Ms Bhutto and her family. The accounts were frozen at Pakistan’s request.
“Miss Bhutto has always said that this was not her money. The accounts were not in her name,” Reymond told The Associated Press.
Swiss and Pakistani investigators allege much of the money came from Societe Generale de Surveillance, one of the world’s largest customs inspection companies, in exchange for business with the Pakistani government when Bhutto was prime minister in the late 1980s and 1990s.
SGS has denied the claims.
In July 2003, a Geneva magistrate convicted Ms Bhutto and her husband in absentia of money laundering under a Swiss law that empowers high-level investigators to impose penalties without a court hearing. They were handed six-month suspended sentences and ordered to pay $11 million (euro 9.1 million) to the Pakistani government. The convictions automatically were thrown out when the pair contested the move.
In July 2004, another Swiss magistrate charged them again, reopening the corruption case.—AP
