Islamabad: The counsel for a radical cleric arrested for allegedly plotting an attack on former Pakistani premier Benazir Bhutto today said he would seek a ban on sale of her last book and a whopping US $ 200 million as damages for incorrectly implicating his client.

The counsel also said he would slap legal notices on the publisher and beneficiaries of Bhutto's last book to stop its sale.

Qari Saifullah Akhtar, a former chief of the outlawed Harkatul Jihad al-Islami who has been linked to Al Qaida chief Osama bin Laden, was last week remanded to police custody till March 27 by a court in Karachi for allegedly planning an attack on Bhutto.

Akhtar's lawyer Hashmat Habib told a news conference here that "innocent people" had been arrested in connection with the plot to assassinate Bhutto to "save those who were behind her murder".

Habib said he would demand US $ 200 million from the printer, publisher and beneficiaries of Bhutto's last book "Reconciliation: Islam, Democracy and the West" because it wrongly implicates Akhtar. He would also seek a ban on its sale.

In the book released after her assassination in December, Bhutto had accused Akhtar of being involved in a plot to bomb her homecoming rally in Karachi on October 19 last year. Over 140 people died in that attack.
Source : PTI