Pakistan probe team flying to Australia
AFP
5 January 1999
KARACHI, Jan 5 (AFP) - A three-member Pakistan judicial commission
team was flying to Australia late Tuesday to cross examine Australian
cricket stars Mark Waugh and Shane Warne on bribery allegations, legal
officials said.
The commission wants to re-examine Waugh and take testimony from Warne
following the pair's admission last month they took money from an
Indian bookmaker for supplying match information in Sri Lanka in 1994.
The team comprises Pakistan Cricket Board legal adviser Ali Sibtain
Fazli, his assisstant Ali Sajjad and Registrar of the Lahore High
Court Abdus Salam Khawar.
They are being joined by a lawyer representing Pakistan player Salim
Malik.
Waugh, Warne and another Australian player, Tim May, alleged Malik
offered them bribes to play poorly during the 1994 tour of Pakistan.
Malik was absolved of all the charges by an independent one-man
inquiry in Pakistan in 1995.
Waugh testified before the commission in October this year during his
team's tour to Pakistan and repeated his accusations against Malik.
The judicial body is expected to return home on January 11.
Warne and Waugh were fined for taking money from the Indian bookmaker
for information on the pitch and weather four years ago. But the
Australian Cricket Board hushed the matter up until last month, when
an Australian newspaper revealed the cover-up.
``This is our chance to find some more truth after Waugh and Warne made
those revelations and we have given Salim Malik another chance to
cross question his accusers,'' Fazli told AFP.
Former Australian Cricket Board chairman Alan Crompton will also make
a statement to the team at its sitting in Melbourne on Friday, they
said.
Malik's lawyer Azmat Saeed will cross question the Australians after
Malik refused to go to Australia personally, terming the trip
``useless.''
ACB Chairman Dennis Rogers on Monday said the Australian players were
happy to testify in public.
The commission, headed by Lahore High Court Judge Malik Mohammad
Qayyum, is expected to give its report before January 31.
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