Leading British tabloid Daily Mail issued an apology to Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif on Thursday after falsely accusing him of wrongdoing in a 2019 story and the newspaper had dropped all claims against the PML-N leader and his son-in-law Imran Khan Ali, the newspaper’s attorneys informed the court.
It should be mentioned that Daily Mail’s journalist David Rose accused Premier Shehbaz of misusing public funds in an article, but Rose was unable to provide evidence to support his claims.
The Mail Online clarified that their July 14, 2019, article about PM Shehbaz, “Did the family of Pakistani politician who has become the poster boy for British overseas aid STEAL funds meant for earthquake victims,” noted on an investigation by Pakistan’s National Accountability Bureau into Sharif and recommended that the money under “investigation included a not insubstantial sum of British public money that was intended for earthquake victims.”
“We accept Mr Sharif has never been accused by the National Accountability Bureau of any wrongdoing in relation to British public money or DFID grant aid. We are pleased to make this clear and apologise to Mr Sharif for this error,” the Daily Mail explained.
The British newspaper claimed in 2019 that Shehbaz had misappropriated and cleaned the money out of the £500 million in foreign aid that had been pumped into Punjab for relief efforts after the devastating earthquake that struck the country in 2005, with the assistance of his family and some close associates.
The news continued to read “Legal documents allege that Shahbaz’s son-in-law received about £1 million from a fund established to rebuild the lives of earthquake victims – to which DFID gave £54 million from UK taxpayers”.
