PESHAWAR: An accountability court here on Monday issued arrest warrants of three women Chinese directors of a mining company after their failure to appear in a case of alleged smuggling of antimony from mines in Chitral to China.

The judge Naveed Ahmad Khan fixed July 11 for next hearing of the case with the direction to local police to produce the three suspects who are charged along with some other directors of the mining firm, Tuny Pak Mineral Private Limited.

The court was informed that the three directors named Ms Hongying Wen and her two daughters, Xe Ping and Han Wen, had not turned up to face trial despite issuance of summons on their names.

The NAB had filed a reference against the three suspects along with some other directors of the firm claiming that the firm had explored antimony from a mining site and had smuggled it to China thus inflicting a loss of $947,000 to the exchequer.

The bureau had started an inquiry against the said company three years ago when the then provincial minister Ziaullah Afridi had levelled certain charges against it alleging that the company had excavated antimony from mines in Chogor area of Chitral but sold it in China without lawful authority and through unfair means. He had alleged that around 413 tons of antimony was smuggled to China by the said company.

The firm had denied the charges and claimed that it had obtained a written permission in Aug 2012 from mines and minerals department for transportation of 500 tons of antimony to China as a sample for testing purposes.

Published in Dawn, June 13th, 2017