Sharif instructed me twice to divert the plane

KARACHI, Jan 26: The criminal trial of deposed prime minister Nawaz Sharif began today with a former colleague taking the witness stand to say he was ordered to divert a passenger plane with the army chief aboard to a Gulf nation, reports AP.

Sharif and six others are charged with hijacking, terrorism, attempted murder and kidnapping in connection with an incident on Oct. 12 - the day the military staged a coup - in which a Pakistan International Airlines plane returning Gen. Pervez Musharraf to Pakistan was refused permission to land in Karachi.

Sharif and his coaccused pleaded not guilty. Three of the four charges carry either the death penalty or life in prison.

The military said Sharif tried to kill the army chief and in the process endangered the lives of all 198 passengers and crew aboard the aircraft, including more than 40 students of American-run schools in Pakistan, which are attended by the children of diplomats.

When the aircraft was eventually allowed to land there was apparently only seven minutes of fuel remaining.

Aminuddin Chaudhry, the former director general of Pakistan's Civil Aviation Authority, and the prosecution's key witness, was the first to testify today. Chaudhry, who had originally been charged along with Sharif, was granted immunity for his testimony.

Before the proceedings adjourned until tomorrow, Sharif's lawyers asked a grim looking Chaudhry whether he had been coerced by police or the military to testify against his former colleagues.

He said there had been no pressure from any quarter.

Chaudhry told the court he received a telephone call from Sharif on the evening of Oct 12 "instructing me that the plane should not be allowed to land anywhere in Pakistan."

Musharraf was returning to Pakistan from Sri Lanka.

Sharif made a second telephone call, this time to say that the aircraft should be diverted to any country in The Gulf, except the United Arab Emirates, said Chaudhry.

After discovering that the aircraft had only 70 minutes of fuel remaining and not enough to reach one of The Gulf states, Chaudhry said he tried and failed to speak again to the prime minister.

Eventually Chaudhry said he received a telephone call from Sharif's military secretary who said the aircraft should be allowed to land in Karachi, but should be parked alone on the runway and surrounded by armored personnel carriers.

Chaudhry said his instructions were to allow the aircraft to refuel and then take off again without allowing any of the passengers to disembark.

"After refuelling the plane it should be redirected to Muscat," in The Gulf, he told the court.

But when Chaudhry contacted the control tower at the Karachi Airport, he said he discovered that the army had taken over. The aircraft was allowed to land. By then the aircraft apparently had only seven minutes of fuel remaining.

Before the criminal trial began Sharif's lawyers argued that the antiterrorist court had no right to begin the trial until Pakistan's Supreme Court decides an earlier legal challenge to the army takeover.

Sharif is charged along with six other men, including his younger brother Shahbaz Sharif, former chief minister of Pakistan's largest province of Punjab.

The accused arrived at the heavily guarded Karachi Municipal Corporation building where the trial is being held, in armored personnel carriers.

Dozens of police with automatic rifles were positioned on nearby rooftops and on the road outside the building there were scores of police and paramilitary soldiers in bullet proof vests and wielding weapons.