Ensure proper facilities for Nawaz: Shehbaz Sharif

 Lahore [Pakistan]: Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) President Shehbaz Sharif on Monday urged authorities to provide adequate and proper facilities to his jailed brother Nawaz Sharif in line with his stature as former prime minister of the country.

On July 6, the father-daughter duo was convicted in absentia in the Avenfield reference case by the Accountability Court. 

While Nawaz has been given 10 years of imprisonment and slapped with a fine of eight million pounds, Maryam was awarded eight years in jail and fined two million pounds.

On arriving at Lahore's Allama Iqbal International Airport from London, the father-daughter duo was arrested on July 14 and were taken to Adiala jail in Rawalpindi in a special chartered flight.

Shehbaz wrote a letter to interim Punjab chief minister Hasan Askari Rizvi requesting proper medical facilities and regular check-ups for Nawaz inside the jail, Geo TV reported.

He also asked for the permission for Nawaz's doctor to regularly visit the jail as his elder brother suffered a heart disease.

Maryam and Nawaz were in London for a month to meet the latter's ailing wife Kulsoom Nawaz, who is undergoing treatment for cancer.

Earlier in the day, Senator Pervaiz Rasheed asserted that Nawaz and his family should be granted the same relief as former Pakistan president Asif Ali Zardari and his sister Faryal Talpur.

"The court earlier upheld that no candidate should be barred from participating in the electoral process till the July 25 polls are over and this was the basis on which Zardari and Talpur were granted relief. 

Nawaz, Maryam and Captain (retd) Muhammad Safdar should be granted the same relief," Rasheed was quoted by Geo TV saying.

On July 12, the Pakistan Supreme Court directed the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) to not summon Zardari and his sister in connection to a money laundering scam till the July 25 elections were over.

Prior to this, the names of Zardari and Talpur were placed on the Exit Control List (ECL) on the orders of the country's apex court.