PESHAWAR: A local court on Wednesday convicted a person charged with money laundering and sentenced him to two years rigorous imprisonment with a fine of Rs1.5 million.

The court of additional sessions judge, Shahid Mehmood, ruled that the prosecution had proved its case against Kamran Iqbal, a resident of Peshawar, and the evidence on record connected him with the commission of the offence.

The accused was charged in an FIR registered at Federal Investigation Agency’s Commercial Banking Circle police station on April 15, 2019, under sections 4 and 23 of Foreign Exchange Regulation Act (FERA), 1947, and sections 3 and 4 of Anti-Money Laundering Act (AMLA), 2010.

During a raid on a premises owned by the accused, the FIA had recovered 550,000 Saudi Riyals and Rs15.3 million.

The court also ordered confiscation of the recovered amount.

The court pronounced his conviction on two counts, sentencing him to one year rigorous imprisonment with a fine of Rs500,000 under the AMLA, and one year imprisonment with a fine of Rs1 million under the FERA.

Javed Ali, a deputy director (legal) of FIA, argued that the accused was arrested with a huge amount of local and foreign currency, about which, he could not give any convincing grounds.

Published in Dawn, September 17th, 2020