WMLR Newsdesk

Thursday 07 August 2003

She was the darling of Pakistan. For a while. Then someone started asking where the money was going.

A Swiss court has convicted Benazir Bhutto, former prime minister of Pakistan of corruption and money laundering.

Bhutto has been sentenced to a suspended sentence of six months and 13 million dollars secreted by Bhutto and her husband have been confiscated.

But although delighted, Pakistan is not satisfied. The charges related to only two accounts but more than sixty accounts have been identified.

The particular case revolves around allegations that Bhutto and her husband received payments of millions of dollars in order to grant a contract to import inspection agency SGS between 1993 and 1996. SGS provided inspection services in Nigeria at around the same time.

Bhutto's husband, Asif Ali Zardari is already in jail in connection with other offences. And the couple are separated. Everyone's biggest problem with Bhutto is that she looks so er.. innocent. She could easily be mistaken for a nun, with her scarf, wide eyes and ready, gentle smile.

Stoking the claims that London is a haven for all manner of international criminals, Bhutto lives in London and is reputedly the owner of an immense country property purchased in the early 1990s for just under GBP20 million and, if the rumours are true, undoubtedly worth far more.

So now the question arises - do UK banks report her accounts and freeze them?

Let's see, shall we. After all, Abacha was able to wander around London with his millions. Let's see if any lessons have been learned.