Smear Tactics Cannot Wipe Out Evidence

25 Jul 2015

(Reproduced with permission)

This post is also available in: Malay, Iban

The cast of characters as depicted by Bloomberg

If all was snowy white concerning the PetroSaudi 1MDB joint venture, surely by now the outraged executives concerned would have arrived in KL with the proof?

All the characters whom Malaysians have come to know well over this saga of stolen billions, Tarek Obaid, Jho Low, Patrick Mahony, Khadem Al Qubaisi and their colleagues, could have presented a clear account of the correct situation.

And the supposed lies by Sarawak Report and all the other critics of 1MDB (including Dr Mahathir, The Edge, numerous foreign journals, DAP and PKR) could have been shown up for the ‘orchestrated plot’ they are alleged to be part of.

However, instead these guys are hiding abroad.

Jho Low has completely disappeared, presumed in Taiwan, where link man Jerome Lee was also headed before being picked up and arrested by immigration authorities.

Jho's friend, Nik Faisal Ariff Kamil, a key organiser of both 1MDB and of the SRC transfers into the PM’s account has also evaded questioning by the Task Force and himself disappeared abroad.

And now the same Task Force has had to put out warrants for two further individuals originally identified by Sarawak Report Jasmine Loo (former UBG) and Casey Tang (1MDB) as people they wish to speak to, but who have disappeared.

Missing…

Nevertheless, defenders of these individuals, who are in positions of power, continue to attempt to dismiss the whole matter as an “orchestrated plot” between unlikely bed-fellows for conflicting reasons. They accuse Sarawak Report in particular of “tampering” and “distortion”.

The ‘evidence’ for this “tampering” relies on the ravings of a discredited man with mental problems in Sarawak – one Lester Melanyi, who is presently enjoying his 15 minutes of infamy.

Plus, some unproven assumptions by a security outfit hired by PetroSaudi itself, called PGI.

And now, it seems, something that may or may not have been said by one of our sources, the former PetroSaudi executive Xavier Justo, who was secretly (and illegally) interviewed by the Straits Times in a Bangkok jail, so his words cannot be tested or confirmed.

Justo has, by the way, yet to be charged or tried on allegations of extortion made by PetroSaudi, who have gone after the whistleblower rather than answering a single one of the specific allegations of illegal activities.

‘Tampering’ not possible, given the chain of events

It is therefore time to deal with the allegation that none of the revelations about the 1MDB PetroSaudi joint venture are true, because it was all a plot by Sarawak Report to get hold of some actual evidence from Justo and then set to work with an unknown IT expert to change the whole meaning of over three million emails, documents and transfers of cash, in order to “topple the government” for some purpose unknown (neo-colonialism being the latest accusation).

The chain of events shows why Sarawak Report could not have tampered with the material, because at the same time they acquired it it also went separately to the Edge and the Sunday Times…. and was then passed on to regulators and law enforcers in the United States.

The material has now also been offered to regulators and law enforcers in the UK and Switzerland and also by the Edge to law enforcers in Malaysia.

Indeed, the various transactions, which have been featured in the articles by Sarawak Report and indeed other publications, passed through numerous banks and regulators. Therefore, if our information had been ‘tampered’, this could easily be proven by testing it against the records of any one of them.

See just one example below of an urgent email trail about the transfer of money from 1MDB to Jho Low’s Good Star account at Coutts Bank in Zurich:

Sent via BlackBerry from T-Mobile
_____
From : jho.low@gmail.com
Date : Fri, 2 Oct 2009 12:28:01 +0000
To :
Subject : Fw: RESEND : URGENT REQUEST OF RBS COUTTS

Shld be cleared soon. Pls update tarek.

Sent via BlackBerry from T-Mobile
_____
From : Shahrol Halmi
Date : Fri, 2 Oct 2009 08:21:15 -0400
To : ‘jacqueline.ho@db.com’ ; Casey Tang
Subject : Re: RESEND : URGENT REQUEST OF RBS COUTTS

Jac, please use this address for GOOD STAR LIMITED.
P.O.Box 1239, Offshore Incorporation Centre, Victoria, Mahe, Republic of Seychelles
Thanks
_____
From : Jacqueline Ho
To : Casey Tang; Shahrol Halmi
Sent : Fri Oct 02 06:19:20 2009
Subject : RESEND : URGENT REQUEST OF RBS COUTTS

Dear Casey and Shahrol

Please see an email request from RBS Coutts to reveal the beneficiary name pertaining to 1MDB’s remittance.

In that sense, I believe RBS needs confirmation on the beneficiary’s name in order to complete their internal risk mitigating processes as no name was

We will await your instructions on whether to reveal the beneficiary name and address (please provide) to RBS Coutts.

As requested by them, we will have to send it out via email and an authenticated swift message so would appreciate a reply as soon as possible.

Best Rgds
Jacqueline Ho
Corporate Coverage
Deutsche Bank (M) Bhd
Tel: + 603 20317798
Mob: +6012 2059561
Email: jacqueline.ho@db.com
—
This e-mail may contain confidential and/or privileged information. If you
are not the intended recipient (or have received this e-mail in error)
please notify the sender immediately and destroy this e-mail. Any
unauthorized copying, disclosure or distribution of the material in this
e-mail is strictly forbidden.

—– Forwarded by Jacqueline Ho/db/dbcom on 10/02/2009 05:41 PM —–

Prakash Gopi/db/dbcom
10/02/2009 04:55 PM
To Jacqueline Ho/db/dbcom@DBAPAC
cc Jeremy Lewis/db/dbcom@DBAPAC
Subject Fw: REQUEST OF COUTCHZZ

Jac,

RBS Coutts is requesting for bene’s full details.

Can we proceed to provide the necessary information. If so, appreciate if you could provide me with the relevant details.

Warm Regards,
Prakash Gopi
Global Market Operations
Deutsche Bank (M) Bhd
03-20536851

—– Forwarded by Prakash Gopi/db/dbcom on 02/10/2009 04:53 PM —–

Laurent.Schmid@rbscoutts.com
02/10/2009 04:38 PM
To Prakash Gopi/db/dbcom@DBAPAC
cc Eliane.Humair@rbscoutts.com, Thomas.Tuerler@rbscoutts.com
Subject RE: REQUEST OF COUTCHZZ

Dear Prakash,

Please urgently confirm the full name of the final beneficiary of the funds per e-mail and authenticated swift (see details below) in order for us to apply the funds.

We are not in a position to credit the funds without full beneficiary details (full name, address, account no.).

Kind regards,

Mr Laurent Schmid
Regulatory Risk
RBS Coutts Bank Ltd
Lerchenstrasse 18
P.O. Box
8022 Zurich, Switzerland
Tel. +41 43 245 53 52
Fax +41 43 245 54 04
laurent.schmid@rbscoutts.com
www.rbscoutts.com
____

From: Humair, Eliane (RBS Coutts, CH)
Sent: Freitag, 2. Oktober 2009 10:27
To: Cousin, Dominik (RBS Coutts, CH); Tuerler, Thomas (RBS Coutts, CH); Schmid, Laurent (RBS Coutts, CH)
Subject: FW: REQUEST OF COUTCHZZ

TO URGENT

Eliane Humair
Investigations Department
RBS Coutts Bank Ltd
Stauffacherstrasse 1
P.O. Box
8022 Zürich
Telephone +41 (0)43 245 58 62
Facsimile +41 (0)43 245 57 99
eliane.humair@rbscoutts.com
www.rbscoutts.com
_____

From: Prakash Gopi [ mailto:prakash.gopi@db.com]
Sent: Freitag, 2. Oktober 2009 10:22
To: Humair, Eliane (RBS Coutts, CH)
Cc: Jeremy Lewis; Krystof Balwierz
Subject: Fw: REQUEST OF COUTCHZZ

Dear Eliane,

I have received this msg from Krystof Balwierz on behalf of yourself today.

May i urgently enquire what further details you require from DEUTMYKL since our MT103 msg had indicated that the funds were to be credited to acc 11116073.

Thank you.

Warm Regards,
Prakash Gopi
Global Market Operations
Deutsche Bank (M) Bhd
03-20536851

—– Forwarded by Prakash Gopi/db/dbcom on 02/10/2009 04:13 PM —–

Chooi-Fong Liew/db/dbcom
02/10/2009 04:09 PM
To Krystof Balwierz/db/dbcom@DBCOM cc
Prakash Gopi/db/dbcom@DBAPAC Subject
Fw: REQUEST OF COUTCHZZ

Hi Krystof

I have forwarded the email to my colleague who is handling this. You can laise directly with him direclty.

Regards.
Chooi fong

—– Forwarded by Chooi-Fong Liew/db/dbcom on 10/02/2009 04:06 PM —–

Chooi-Fong Liew/db/dbcom
10/02/2009 04:01 PM
To Prakash Gopi/db/dbcom@DBAPAC cc
Subject
Fw: REQUEST OF COUTCHZZ

Pls help.

—– Forwarded by Chooi-Fong Liew/db/dbcom on 10/02/2009 04:01 PM —–

Chooi-Fong Liew/db/dbcom
10/02/2009 03:59 PM
To Connie Lam/db/dbcom@DBAPAC, Umadevi Maslamani/db/dbcom@DBAPAC cc
Subject Fw: REQUEST OF COUTCHZZ

HI

Pls note email below . Did you send the pymt instruction? Bene Bank unable to apply. Pls provide addl details via BKTRUS33.

Thanks.
Chooi fong

Any one of these banks and the regulators could point out if this email trail was false or had been tampered, in the same way that BSI Bank told the Singapore monetary authorities that a bank statement provided by 1MDB to Arul Kanda alleging earlier this year that there was some US$1.3 billion in their bank account was forged.

Chain of events

Jho Low’s friend on the run Nik Faisal Ariff Kamil

Sarawak Report introduced Justo to the managers of The Edge in Singapore in February at a meeting at the Fullerton Hotel, as acknowledged. We had learnt of Justo’s material almost a year before and had tracked him down and gained his trust.

The Edge were accompanied by a team of computer experts, Sarawak Report was alone.

It was agreed that Mr Justo should hand over the material and it was given to the experts.

The next day the experts made three copies of the material, one of which was handed to SR, one to the Edge and another copied for safe keeping.

SR immediately returned to London.

It soon became clear that the material was very hard to access owing to the nature of the software.

Sarawak Report went to the Sunday Times, who then used their own computer experts to finally open the material.

The Sunday Times broke their own story on 1MDB at the same time as SR, based on their own analysis of Justo’s documents

It was a copy of this decrypted material from the Sunday Times that was finally returned to Sarawak Report to utilise. The Sunday Times still has the original de-crypted copy.

Meanwhile, The Edge had to put its own computer experts onto their copy of the same material back on the other side of the world in Singapore. They too finally managed to open the file and completely separately have come to exactly the same conclusions about the nature of the PetroSaudi deal.

Sarawak Report had by then given its original copy of the material gained in Singapore (retrieved from the Sunday Times, who retain their decrypted copy) to a team of official investigators from the United States, who came to London to take a statement from Sarawak Report.

Apart from the material decrypted by the Sunday Times, Sarawak Report also had a disc of some key documents selected from the files by Justo, which showed a taste of what had been going on at the deal.

These had been given by Justo to Sarawak Report separately and they matched what was decrypted by the Sunday Times and separately by the Edge.

Justo subsequently sent a second copy of the entire material direct on a disc to Sarawak Report, which is placed in safe hands. If Sarawak Report had tampered with the original material it received, this also would differ from the version we used.

Likewise, the Edge received a second version separately from Justo at a later date. Again, this would have to differ from the version supposedly ‘tampered’ by Sarawak Report because it was sent separately to the Edge.

The Edge’s closely argued analysis was based on documents received at the same time but separately to SR. How could we have tampered with them?

Yet all the outlets who received the material came to the same conclusions about the nature of the 1MDB PetroSaudi deal, in particular that US$700 million had been siphoned out by a company controlled by Jho Low.

Indeed, it is now on record that the Chairman of the Board of 1MDB resigned over the matter shortly after the deal was done in 2009.

And, as numerous other news organisations and political and financial analysts have pointed out, the evidence from the PetroSaudi database provided by Justo corroborates a slew evidence and concerns about the deal that have been expressed for many years – and have landed the fund in a whole hell of a lot of debt right now.

So this wishful thinking by the defenders of the fugitives from 1MDB really won’t wash.

If all we had written was a whole lot of nonsense, the investigators from the Task Forces and the PAC would have thrown in the towel weeks ago and declared us mischievous liars. Instead, they have dug up piles more incriminating evidence and issued warrants of arrest to 1MDB executives who have start fleeing like flies.

Evil motives?

There is also the question as to why Sarawak Report would have got involved in a convoluted plot to distort such documents, which were quite explosive enough as it is?

We have been hacked, followed and bugged over past weeks, presumably in the hope of finding some commercial conspiracy that can be pointed to. Maybe the hackers are coming up with some distortions of their own to allege just that.

Remember the facade? All the Arab money that was to be invested in Malaysia? Not one penny was forthcoming…..

However, Sarawak Report was motivated by something much more simple, straightforward and plainly understandable by most people.

This was a desire to reveal a massive scandal in Malaysia that symbolises the corruption and exploitation, which has resulted in the destruction of the Borneo Jungle and the theft of so many of the natural resources of Malaysia from its people.

This in turn symbolises a global problem, which is driven by greedy individuals across a number of countries. The world’s banking regulators, governments and professional institutions need to work far harder and more honestly to prevent it.

If not, everyone else suffers as the rule of law is undermined.

This feels like a good enough motive to us – how about to everyone else?

Thanks to this problem, development in Malaysia has given way to debauched greed on the part of the very few at the top of the pile, as the image of the as yet hardly touched wasteland at the so-called Tun Razak Exchange symbolises in a nutshell.

These are the questions the perpetrators should have to answer – we and the others who have exposed this problem have been happy to be open about our side of the story.