Videogate: Judge Arshad Malik calls for ‘criminal proceedings against Mian Tariq, others’

Accountability judge files complaint with the FIA Cybercrime Circle Islamabad for illegal video recording, blackmail

Judge Arshad Malik has filed a complaint with the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) cybercrime wing in Islamabad against Mian Tariq and his accomplices for 'illegally' recording his videos and images with the intent to blackmail.

In the complaint filed on Monday, he called for the registration of a criminal case against them for criminal intimidation and subverting the course of justice.

The judge sent his complaint to FIA Director General Bashir Memon in which he called for criminal proceedings against Mian Tariq and his aides for illegally recording footage of him for blackmail, criminal intimidation and subversion of justice.

Judge Malik said that when he was serving as assistant district and session judge in Multan from 2001 to 2003, Tariq first intoxicated him and then proceeded to secretly make compromising footage of him.





“He [Mian Tariq] manipulated the compromising video into an immoral one with the intent to blackmail me,” the judge added.

“Years have passed and four months ago I came to know that Mian Tariq sold the footage to Lahore-based PML-N leader Mian Raza,” the statement goes on to read.

The judge also said that the PML-N began to using strong-arm tactics to help incarcerated former prime minister Nawaz Sharif in the accountability proceedings of the Al-Azizia reference.

“During a meeting with Nawaz at his residence in Lahore’s Jati Umra and in Medina with his son Hussain Nawaz they tried to make me say things  which could further their nefarious designs,” judge Malik added.

He said that the controversial video shown by PML-N) Vice-President Maryam Nawaz and other senior party leadership has been electronically forged and  tempered.

Judge Malik added that the videos are being used as propaganda against him and the judiciary.

Earlier this month, Maryam had revealed a video that purportedly showed judge Malik admitting that he had been “blackmailed” into convicting Nawaz in Al-Azizia reference “despite no evidence of corruption” against him.

On July 12, the law ministry barred the judge from serving as an accountability court judge after the Islamabad High Court (IHC) requested his removal over the controversial video.

On December 4, 2018 judge Malik had handed former prime minister Nawaz Sharif seven years in jail in the Al-Azizia Steel Mills reference. He, however, had acquitted Nawaz in a second reference related to Flagship Investments.