Former Pakistan PM gets 10 years for corruption, daughter sentenced to seven

Hours after a Pakistani court convicted Nawaz Sharif and his daughter of corruption on Friday, the former premier said in London he will return to the country and face prison as soon as he is able to have a word with his wife who is on a ventilator.

The sentence, 10 years in prison and a fine of 8 million pounds, or $13.9 million (CAD), came nearly a year after Pakistan's Supreme Court removed Sharif from office and fewer than five months after the court barred him from holding office for life.

His daughter Maryam Nawaz has been awarded seven and her husband Captain (retd) Safdar one year imprisonment in the case.

Nawaz Sharif and Maryam are now in London visiting Kulsoom Nawaz, who is suffering from cancer and is undergoing treatment there.

The Sharifs were accused of embezzling public funds to offshore accounts that were used to purchase four high valued Avenfield properties, an apartment block on Park Lane in central London.

1976 - Enters politics, joining the Pakistan Muslim League (PML) after the Sharif family steel business was nationalized under the government of Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, the beginning of a long political rivalry between the families.

He says he will return to Pakistan to appeal the judgment.

Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) and Awami Muslim League termed the verdict historical, while other political parties called for across-the-board accountability.

"This decision was in fact written and dictated by armed forces", Mohamed Sidique Awan, an attorney and Sharif supporter, claimed when speaking with NPR's Diaa Hadid.

Qadri, who left PML-N last month and is now contesting polls as an independent candidate, said that PML-N has lost popularity among masses and people are not even letting party's candidates enter the constituencies.

He has framed the charges against him as a conspiracy by the powerful military, which has ruled Pakistan for roughly half its 70-year history.

He said the party will challenge the ruling first in the high court and later in the Supreme court.

The verdict is from one of the three cases filed against Sharif and his family by Pakistan's federal anti-corruption body, the National Accountability Bureau.

As per an election campaign travel log of party supremo Imran Khan, he will be making several campaign stops at 25 different cities of Punjab, Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa and Sindh ahead of the July 25 general election. According to the Joint Investigating Team (JIT) report submitted in Panamagate case, the sharifs gave contradictory statements about the London flats that actually belonged to them since 1993. "Now robbers will not go into assemblies, but to jails", he told a roaring crowd of thousands.

Sharif's younger brother, Shehbaz Sharif, who has taken over the PML-N leadership, said on Thursday recent action by the anti-graft National Accountability Bureau and the judiciary had cast doubt over the election.