FIA confiscates properties worth Rs3.5b from MQM’s KKF

F.P. Report

KARACHI: The Federal Investigation Agency confiscated on Thursday as many as many 29 properties of the MQM’s welfare wing the Khidmat-e-Khalq Foundation in a money laundering case.

The total worth of the properties is over Rs3.5 billion. According to the FIA, the properties, in different areas of Karachi, were bought or constructed with money gained through extortion.

The FIA seized 29 properties of the charity wing, saying they were established using extortion money.

The investigation authority said the money collected through donations was being sent to London with the help of six different facilitators. Besides, an amount of money was also being given to families of martyrs of the party from the donations.

‘We’ve not yet stopped dispensation of money to heirs of the martyrs,’ the FIA said. “The facilitators who sent money to London included Babar Ghauri and Sohail Mansoor. Transactions were also made under fake names to send the money abroad”, revealed the investigation.

The anti-terrorism wing of the FIA is further probing the matter.

In Nov 2018, the FIA had released a list of 726 suspects, including Mayor Karachi Waseem Akhtar, involved in money laundering through KKF.

Mayor Karachi Waseem Akhtar, Qamar Mansoor, Ashfaque Mangi, Tanveer-ul-Haq Thanvi and other important names were listed among the culprits.

As per investigations of the FIA, more than 50 MQM leaders were involved in illegal transfer of money. The FIA had cautioned that suspected MQM leaders will be nabbed immediately, as the probe reaches its final phase.

The government had sought information from the relevant countries in this regard and a lawyer, Barrister Toby Codman, has been appointed by the federal government in the UK.