Pakistan Prime Minister Resigns

Pakistan Prime Minister Resigns 

Nawaz Sharif has resigned as prime minister of Pakistan following a decision by the country’s Supreme Court to disqualify him from office

The charges against Sharif and three of his children two sons and a daughter stemmed from disclosures last year in the Panama Papers, which revealed that the children owned expensive residential property in London through a string of offshore companies. In their ruling on Friday, the justices also ordered the opening of criminal investigations against the Sharif family.

Sharif has consistently denied any wrongdoing in the case.

The verdict was handed down unanimously by a five-member bench in the court.

A spokesman for Sharif’s office said in a statement “Following the verdict, Nawaz Sharif has resigned from his responsibilities as prime minister”.

The Supreme Court had asked the members of the Sharif family to provide a paper trail of the money they used to buy their London apartments. Investigators found that they were “living beyond their means.”

Despite repeated court exhortations, Sharif’s family and its lawyers failed to provide satisfactory documentation, the justices said. Several of the documents they produced were declared fake or insufficient.

The court was filled to capacity today, and there was heightened security in the capital, with tens of thousands of troops and police deployed.

Reuters news agency reports one of the judges at the Supreme Court, said that Sharif was no longer “eligible to be an honest member of the parliament”