Pak SC grants 2 more months to panel probing memo issue

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan's Supreme Court today gave the judicial commission investigating the memo issue two more months to complete its probe and said the panel would decide on American businessman Mansoor Ijaz's request to record his statement outside the country.

A nine-judge bench headed by Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry also lifted a foreign travel ban on Pakistan's former ambassador to the US, Husain Haqqani, who had resigned after the scandal became public.

Acting on an application filed by the three-judge commission seeking an extension of its term, the bench gave the panel two more months to complete its probe.

Attorney General Anwar-ul-Haq told the bench that the government did not have any reservations on term of the commission being extended.

The Supreme Court had formed the commission on December 30 and given it four weeks to complete its investigation.

The term of the commission would have ended today. The apex court rejected an application from Ijaz that said the commission should be asked to record his statement outside Pakistan.

The court said the commission should decide whether it wants to go abroad to record Ijaz's statement or to call him to Pakistan.

Ijaz, who made the mysterious memo public, has failed to make two scheduled appearances before the commission, which has given him a final opportunity to depose on February 9.

The Attorney General further informed the bench that Canadian firm Research In Motion had refused to hand over data of alleged conversations between Ijaz and Haqqani.