PESHAWAR: An accountability court here on Wednesday remanded Ameer Ghazan Khan, the brother of former chief minister Ameer Haider Khan Hoti, into custody of National Accountability Bureau (NAB) for 10 days in a case of alleged embezzlement in procurement of weapons for the police department.

The court comprising Judge Mohammad Ibrahim Khan directed the NAB officials to produce the suspect again on April 23.

Mr Ghazan was arrested by NAB, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, a day earlier after Peshawar High Court denied him pre-arrest bail in the same case.

He was produced before the accountability court amid strict security. Special prosecutor, Lajbar Khan, and other officials of NAB produced the suspect before the court and requested the judge to grant them his physical custody so as to conduct investigation in the case.

The officials stated that an approver in the case, Arshad Majeed, a private contractor, had claimed that he had paid Rs195 million to him through his front man Raza Ali.

They added that in return of the payment he had asked Mr Majeed to raise the price of bullet proof jackets, which he was providing to the police department, from the already approved price.

The counsel appearing for Mr Ghazan opposed the physical remand stating that NAB had already filed a reference before the court wherein his client was charged along with a former provincial police officer, Malik Naveed, and several others.

He added that filing of the reference showed that investigation had already been completed, therefore, there was no need of remanding Mr Ghazan into custody of NAB.

The NAB has claimed that an amount of over Rs7 Billion was released by provincial government for procurement of weapons, vehicles and equipment for countering the unabated law and order situation in the province.

A formal reference of Rs2.03 billion has already been filed against 10 of the suspects including Malik Naveed, the commandant of Frontier Constabulary, Abdul Majeed Marwat, Mr Ghazan, Mr Raza and six other police officials.