The minister should instead ask how could the Malaysian government reclaim other assets in Malaysia or overseas that belonged to the duo, added Haniff.
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That appears to point directly at Najib, who was forced to admit a year ago that he received $681 million in his personal accounts in 2013.
The revelations could undermine his credibility and give new ammunition to a movement to force him from office.
Malaysia’s fragmented opposition parties have been in disarray over policy differences after winning the popular vote in the last general election in 2013.
As the scandal escalated, Najib purged 1MDB critics from his cabinet, curbed domestic investigations, and enacted a tough new security law, sparking accusations that he was imperilling Malaysia’s already fragile democracy to save his skin.
Malaysian social media users hammered Najib on Thursday as a kleptocrat and a liar, and #MalaysianOfficial1 became the country’s top-trending Twitter hashtag.
Najib has consistently denied any wrongdoing.
The US Justice Department is seeking to seize more than US$1 billion (NZ$1.4b) worth of property it says went through US banks from the Malaysian development fund, known as 1MDB, and was ultimately used to illegally acquire assets.
More than a third of that money was misappropriated by corrupt officials, she said.
Swiss bank BSI was kicked out of the city in May for “serious breaches” of Singapore’s anti-money laundering rules in its business dealings with 1MDB. “Those people involved will have their say through the court process in the United States”, Najib said.
The DOJ complaint describes Riza as a relative of an unnamed “Malaysian Official 1” whose approval was needed for the fund’s financial commitments.
Datuk Seri Najib, who maintains he has not done anything wrong, said that the United States lawsuits were “a civil, not a criminal, procedure”, reported Reuters.
The lawsuits also named Malaysian financier Jho Low and Abu Dhabi government officials Khadem Abdulla Al-Qubaisi and Mohammed Ahmed Badawy Al-Husseiny. “I think, who is, you can decide from the description of “Malaysian Official 1″ found in the report by the Justice Department in America”. Both are cited as possessing assets bought with money stolen from 1MDB.
– $1.37 billion was diverted from a pair of 2012 bond offerings to accounts in the British Virgin Islands and Singapore believed controlled by Low, as was $1.26 billion raised in a 2013 bond sale.
No criminal charges were filed.
Najib said he viewed the USA action seriously but pointed out that it was limited to the individuals named in the complaints. “Wait for the karma!” said a posting on Najib’s Facebook page.
A spokesman for the Saudi embassy in Washington declined to comment on Wednesday.
The Justice Department complaint mentions no such gift.
Singapore has seized S$240 million ($177 million) in suspicious bank accounts in the city, its forces said in a statement issued on Wednesday.
He said that the prime minister has not been named a defendant in the DOJ complaints.
Representatives of 1MDB said in a statement that the fund would cooperate. It does not identify the prince. Tens of millions of dollars diverted from 1MDB were used to produce it, prosecutors said.
The prime minister’s office did not respond to inquiries about those two deposits. It claimed this was the amount embezzled from the state fund.
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Mr Najib created 1MDB in 2009 to promote Malaysia’s economic development. He oversaw its activities in his concurrent role as finance minister. The petition is intended for presentation to Sultan Abdul Halim, Malaysia’s reigning king, but Mahathir said attempts to secure an audience with the palace have so far been unsuccessful. Investigators from different government agencies suspected that the money came from 1MDB. Special Agent Darryl Wegner, chief of the FBI’s International Corruption Unit, said that leaders of the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission showed “tremendous courage” in pursuing the investigation. The attorney general was dismissed after he repeatedly criticised the prime minister’s handling of the case. The scandal has precipitated demands in Malaysia for Najib’s resignation and a series of global investigations in the matter.
