Served as ambassador, not as political representative: Haqqani

Former envoy of Pakistan to Sri Lanka and the United States, Husain Haqqani, on Tuesday denied allegations of raising funds for the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) from overseas Pakistanis and said he had served as the country's ambassador and not as a political representative. 

Information Minister Fawad Chaudhry had claimed that that the former ambassador raised funds for the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) from overseas Pakistanis while serving as ambassador to the US.

The minister had claimed, while speaking to the media on December 12, that the PPP, under the control of Pakistan’s then ambassador to the US Husain Haqqani, had set up a company in the US that collected funds of millions of dollars for the party without informing about their sources.

"The claim is new and is being made ten years too late," Haqqani said."I understand that the ruling PTI is facing serious charges over fundraising in foreign countries and Fawad Chaudhry needs to deal with the issue but, that does not justify making false statements."

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The ex-envoy added that the record would prove that he never attended party events or Pakistani community fundraisers while he was ambassador from 2008 to 2011.

“I was focused exclusively on US-Pakistan relations as an ambassador and the only Pakistani politician visiting the US for fundraising from the Pakistani community in that period is the current information minister’s current boss," said Haqqani. 

Fawad's allegations came after he demanded that the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) should audit the foreign sources of funding of all political parties and make them public.

He maintained that while the ECP’s scrutiny committee had audited the foreign funding sources of the PTI, it had not made any significant proceedings in the cases of the PML-N and PPP.