ISLAMABAD - Former interior minister Rehman Malik will appear before the joint investigation team (JIT) – probing the Panama leaks scandal – on June 23rd.

The Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) leader returned from abroad on Monday and had previously sought time from the JIT to appear on grounds of being out of the country.

The JIT had earlier summoned Senator Malik to appear on June 13th in connection with the Panama leaks case.

Senator Malik denies any wrongdoing.

On return from London he told The Nation: “I am back in the country. I will appear before the JIT on June 23rd.”

Last year, a huge leak of confidential documents revealed how the rich and powerful use tax havens to hide their wealth.

Eleven million documents were leaked from one of the world’s most secretive companies, Panamanian law firm Mossack Fonseca.

They showed how Mossack Fonseca had helped clients launder money, dodge sanctions and avoid tax. The company says it has operated beyond reproach for 40 years and had never been charged with criminal wrong-doing.

The JIT has also summoned Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif to appear on June 15th. The premier – who flew to Riyadh on Monday - is expected to answer investigators’ questions.

The JIT has directed Sharif to “bring along all relevant record/documents/material.”

PM Sharif’s two sons, Hussain Nawaz and Hassan Nawaz, have attended the JIT proceedings several times over the recent weeks.

Meanwhile, on Monday, PPP Senator Saeed Ghani said that the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) was a home for political nomads and corrupt former government servants.

Reacting to the accusations against PPP Co-Chairman Asif Ali Zardari levelled by the PTI chief, Imran Khan, Ghani asked Imran Khan to inquire from his lieutenants, — Asad Umar and Jahangir Tareen about corruption of their elders.

“Why their fathers’ were dismissed from government service,” the senator asked.

The lawmaker said that Imran Khan and Nawaz Sharif were two sides of the same coin and both were “nurtured under the umbrella of establishment.”

He added: “Imran Khan is master of double talk as on [the] one hand he says that the corrupt should be in prison and on the other hand visits a corrupt to the core character Irfan Marwat. Imran Khan cannot hoodwink people of Pakistan as people know the real faces of all these corrupt elements of the country.”

He questioned: “Why Imran Khan’s father Ikramullah Niazi, Jahangir Tareen’s father Allah Nawaz Tareen and Asad Umar’s father Ghulam Umar were dismissed from their government jobs?”