British anti-fraud agency joins 1MDB corruption probe
(MMO) – Amid increasing global scrutiny, a UK government department has started its own independent corruption investigation into the 1 Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB) scandal.
British daily, The Times, reported in its Sunday edition that its country’s Serious Fraud Office is looking into the 1MDB allegations published in the Sarawak Report, a London-based whistleblower website founded by Clare Rewcastle-Brown, the sister-in-law of former British Prime Minister Gordon Brown.
“The Serious Fraud Office is examining evidence, uncovered by a British campaigner, of an alleged money-laundering scandal that threatens to topple the Malaysian prime minister,” The Times reported yesterday.
It also wrote that the Serious Fraud Office is also examining the case where Swiss authorities have frozen bank accounts linked to 1MDB amid investigation into the troubled state-owned firm.
Hong Kong police have also started investigations on bank deposits of more than US$250 million in the city that were allegedly linked to Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak, the Financial Times reported last Friday.
