Why withhold documents, ask Najib’s lawyer

KUALA LUMPUR: Not all documents obtained by the prosecution from foreign countries during the 1Malaysia Development Bhd (1MDB) investigation were turned over to Datuk Seri Najib Razak’s defence team, the High Court has been told.

Senior Supt Nur Aida Arifin of the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) testified that several documents obtained from other countries through Mutual Legal Assistance (MLA) were not handed over as they were irrelevant to her investigation.

The other countries that have assisted with the documents were Singapore, Hong Kong, Barbados and Switzerland.

Najib’s lead counsel Tan Sri Muhammad Shafee Abdullah then questioned Nur Aida on her decision to “withhold” the documents from the defence team regardless of their relevance.

Nur Aida said she had given a briefing to the prosecution team who agreed that the documents were irrelevant to the 1MDB case.

Muhammad Shafee also probed the 49th prosecution witness on 23 documents from Switzerland that he said contained conflicting dates.

The court earlier heard from Nur Aida that she had received documents from Switzerland six times beginning Jan 28, 2019 in the form of compact discs..

Muhammad Shafee, however, pointed out that the date indicated on the document was March 2019.

Najib, 70, is on trial for 25 charges in total – four for abuse of power that allegedly brought him financial benefit to the tune of RM2.28bil, and 21 for money laundering involving the same amount of money.

The trial resumes before Justice Collin Lawrence Sequerah next Monday.