He was commenting on the statement by US Attorney General Loretta Lynch yesterday that a number of individuals were found to have been abusing 1MDB funds to siphon off some money into their personal bank accounts.
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The asset seizure would be the largest ever under Washington’s 2010 Kleptocracy Asset Recovery Initiative, which targets ill-gotten gains of world leaders that pass through the US.
Earlier this week, the U.S. justice department filed lawsuits seeking to reclaim more than $1 billion in assets linked to stolen or laundered 1MDB funds.
Red Granite said on Wednesday that none of the funding it received to make the Oscar-nominated film, which took $400 million at the box office worldwide, was illegitimate and nothing the company or Riza did was wrong.
Some of the money was spent by people linked to the fund on resorts, luxury residences and fine art, the U.S. said.
Najib, who has consistently denied any wrongdoing, said on Thursday the US lawsuits were “a civil not a criminal procedure”.
Najib said in response to the lawsuits that his government would give its full cooperation to worldwide investigations of the 1MDB case.
Najib was speaking to reporters on Thursday, a day after the U.S. Justice Department said it has initiated action to seize more than $1 billion of the stolen money that was allegedly used to buy assets in the U.S.by people close to Najib.
Federal officials say the funds laundered into the USA for the benefit of 1MDB officials and their associates were used to pay for property including Manhattan penthouses and Beverly Hills mansions; to settle gambling debts at Las Vegas casinos; and to pay for a London interior decorator, expensive paintings and the production of films, including the 2013 Oscar-nominated movie “The Wolf of Wall Street”.
US prosecutors say money taken from the fund was moved through shell companies and hidden in the USA via the purchase of high-end properties in NY and California and luxury goods.
The U.S. Justice Department lawsuits filed in a federal court on Wednesday did not name Najib, instead referring to “Malaysian Official 1”. Early this year, Apandi cleared the Prime Minister of any wrongdoing, declaring the money to be a political donation from the Saudi royal family.
At home, former premier Mahathir Mohamad led a chorus of opposition voices calling on Najib to step down.
1MDB, or 1Malaysia Development Berhad, was set up in 2009 by Mr Najib and controlled by him in his concurrent role as finance minister.
The Swiss banks were among five financial institutions named in a joint statement by Singapore’s financial regulator, police force and state prosecutor on Thursday.
He said Najib’s position as Prime Minister is secure as long as his position as Umno president is safe. United States prosecutors filed a complaint detailing an alleged scheme of global money-laundering and misappropriation stretching from 2009 to 2015.
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“I am not Malaysian Official 1”, he says in the clip.
