Pakistan defence minister stopped from leaving country

Islamabad, Dec 18 : Pakistan Defence Minister Chaudhry Ahmed Mukhtar was Thursday stopped from leaving the country at the airport here, a media report said.

The minister, along with his delegation, was scheduled to leave the country for an official visit to China. He was intercepted by the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) staff at the Islamabad airport as he was about to board the flight, Geo TV reported.

Mukhtar, whose name was placed on Exit Control List (ECL) after the supreme court verdict on the National Reconciliation Ordinance (NRO) was told that he was not allowed to leave the country, the report said.

The court had ruled Wednesday that the decree (NRO) protecting Pakistan President Asif Ali Zardari and his allies against charges of corruption was illegal and against the constitution.

The NRO, issued by former president Pervez Musharraf, had scrapped all corruption cases against politicians and bureaucrats filed between January 1986 and October 1999, on the grounds that they may have been politically motivated.

The ordinance allowed Benazir Bhutto and her husband Zardari to return to Pakistan.