Asif Ali Zardari Profile - Profile of Pakistan's Asif Ali Zardari, Widow of Benazir Bhutto
Zardari Charged With Attempted Murder and Extortion:
It wasn’t long before Zardari faced his first arrest—an attempted-murder and extortion charge in 1990 stemming from an alleged plot that April. Zadari and accomplice Ghulam Hussain Unar. Unar and Zardari allegedly strapped a remote-controlled bomb to the leg of Pakistani-born British businessman Murtaza Hussain Bukhari, who was discussing plans to build a hospital in Pakistan, and forced him to cash $800,000 in checks.
Zardari was imprisoned. He contested the charges, calling them politically motivated. Bhutto was prime minister at the time but was ousted in October 1990.
From Prison to Finance Minister to Second Murder Charge:
A special court acquitted Zardari of bank fraud and conspiracy to murder charges. He was released in February 1993. When Zardari’s wife became prime minister again months later, she named him finance minister—a post that did not exist. The couple built a $50 million “prime minister’s residence" on 110 acres on an Islamabad hilltop.
Zardari also acquired the 365-acre, $8 million Rockwood Estate in Surrey, England, and a $4 million estate in Palm Beach County, Florida. Cases of Zardari and Bhutto corruption piled up fast during her second tenure as prime minister.
A Laundry List of Corruption Allegations:
Charges and allegations included:
* Zardari buying almost $1 million worth of jewelry through a Swiss bank account and an American Express card.
* Zardari taking kickbacks from a Dubai gold trader.
* French military contractor Dassault Aviation agreeing to pay Zardari $200 million in exchange for a $4 billion jet fighter deal with Pakistan. (The deal fell apart when Bhutto was booted out of government.)
* In 1996, Zardari was arrested again and charged with murdering his wife’s brother.
Zardari was imprisoned. Pakistan’s president dismissed Bhutto for corruption. Zardari was in prison until 2004.
The government claimed Bhutto and Zardari siphoned $1.5 billion in public money during Bhutto’s second term. None of the charges stuck, though Pakistan is still, according to The New Yorker's Steve Coll, looking into more than $54 million allegedly stashed in Swiss bank accounts by the Bhutto family. Investigators, Coll writes, are also "looking into companies involved in Iraq's oil-for-food program, under Saddam Hussein, from which Bhutto allegedly benefited."
From Manhattan’s Upper East Side Back to Politics Again:
Zardari won his release from prison after his wife’s Pakistan Peoples Party negotiated a deal with Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf. Zardari moved to Manhattan’s wealthy Upper East Side, where he lived for three years.
Following his wife’s assassination, Zardari claimed her will named him as her successor to the leadership of the Pakistan Peoples Party. Zardari asked his son, Bilawal, to be the party chairman, though Zardari clearly intended to wield the power. On Aug. 22, the PPP nominated him for the Pakistani presidency vacated by Musharraf earlier that week. The election was set for Sept. 6.
Dear ejaz007 Zardari is already a threat to Pakistan now one of his official title is "Friend of India", every move he makes, everything that he says is clearly a risk to National Security. This retard is not less than donald rumsfield.
