1MDB updates - U.S. Department of Justice targets $1 billion in assets in 1MDB embezzlement case

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[Thank you to Shervin Majlessi, 
Senior Legal Adviser
, World Bank/United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, Stolen Asset Recovery Initiative (StAR)
, Bangkok, Thailand, for sharing this information.]

The U.S. Department of Justice has issued a forfeiture complaint charging that multi-million dollar properties -- including a Manhattan penthouse and a Van Gogh painting -- were among the more than $1 billion in United States assets bought with money stolen from Malaysia’s 1MDB sovereign wealth fund. Read the New York Times story here: http://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/21/world/asia/1mdb-malaysia-us-assets-seized.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&clickSource=story-heading&module=second-column-region&region=top-news&WT.nav=top-news&_r=1

The full text of the 136-page forfeiture complaint issued by the Kleptocracy Asset Recovery Initiative of the U.S. Department of Justice is available here: https://www.justice.gov/opa/file/877166/download

Malaysia's Communications and Multimedia Minister Datuk Seri Dr Salleh Said Keruak issued a statement on 21 July 2016 in response to the U.S. Department of Justice action, saying 1MDB has been the subject of "unprecedented politically-motivated attacks, the objectives of which were to unseat a democratically-elected head of government". Read the statement as published in New Straits Times: http://www.nst.com.my/news/2016/07/159658/statement-salleh-keruak-over-us-justice-dept-1mdb

Abu Kassim Mohamed, head of the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission, has confirmed that the agency is cooperating with the US Federal Bureau of Investigation in its investigations concerning funds linked to 1MDB. He clarifies that the cooperation is only about the possibility of money-laundering by a businessman said to have duped 1MDB. Read the Free Malaysia Today story here: http://www.freemalaysiatoday.com/category/nation/2016/07/24/macc-fbi-link-is-about-money-laundering/

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