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ISLAMABAD: An application piloted by leaders of the PML-N reached the Supreme Court on Friday with a request to summon Pakistan’s High Commissioner in Britain, Wajid Shamsul Hassan.
Jointly filed by Senator Muhammad Ishaq Dar and MNA Khawaja Asif, the application requested the apex court to consider making three more individuals — Mr Shamsul Hassan and two senior journalists of an English daily — a party in PML-N chief Nawaz Sharif’s petition over the scandal.
A nine-judge larger bench will resume hearing on the matter on Monday.
Except for President Asif Ali Zardari, all respondents in the petition, including Army chief Gen Parvez Kayani, ISI chief Lt Gen Shuja Pasha, former ambassador to the US Husain Haqqani, Pakistani-American businessman Mansoor Ijaz and the federal government, have submitted their replies to the court.
The PML-N leaders requested the court to direct the foreign ministry to ensure the presence of Wajid Shamsul Hassan and once he arrived in the country, he should be restrained from leaving till the Supreme Court delivered its judgment. The application said the three individuals should be summoned to assist the court.
Shamsul Hassan should be called because in his interviews to CNN, BBC and India’s NDTV channels, the diplomat had claimed that Pakistan learnt about plans for the May 2 US raid on Osama bin Laden’s compound “eight to ten days in advance”.
Stories based on the interviews and written by Journalists Shaheen Sehbai and Mohammad Malick appeared in an English newspaper.
According to the application, the diplomat even claimed that Pakistan assisted in terms of authorisation of the US helicopters’ flight in Pakistani airspace and that Pakistan knew about Osama’s presence.
Pakistan also helped the Americans reach the Al Qaeda leader, Shamsul Hassan was quoted as saying.
In another report in the same newspaper on Dec 8, Mansoor Ijaz was quoted as saying that Husain Haqqani and President Zardari had prior knowledge about the US stealth mission to eliminate Osama bin Laden.
The editor of the newspaper has also authored numerous reports on the memo scandal.
