Cops to meet AG on whether Altantuya probe needed

(FMT) – Federal police are to hold talks with the Attorney-General on whether there is a need for additional investigations into the 2006 murder of Mongolian woman Altantuya Shaariibuu. 

The Deputy Inspector-General of Police Noor Rashid Ibrahim said the discussions with Attorney-General Tommy Thomas were needed as the case had already been decided by the courts and sentences had been meted out.

He said the police would review the investigation papers to look for any new aspects that would require them to reopen the case, Bernama reported.

He also said the police would study whether there was a need to set up a committee to monitor the investigations. 

Noor Rashid said witnesses would be called up if there were new elements on the case based on the police report lodged by Altantuya’s father, Setev Shaariibuu. 

Setev has filed a police report calling for a fresh investigation, and for evidence to be obtained from a key witness, DSP Musa Safri, a former aide-de-camp to Najib Razak, who was then deputy prime minister.

He had said Musa might have knowledge about the case but did not testify at the trial of the two policemen accused of Altantuya’s murder. Noor Rashid said police believed Musa was still in the country.

Two members of a police bodyguard unit have been convicted and sentenced to death for the murder of Altantuya, who was shot and her body blown up with explosives in a jungle near Subang. In 2015, the Federal Court affirmed the conviction and death sentences pronounced on Chief Inspector Azilah Hadri and Corporal Sirul Azhar Umar.

A co-defendant, Abdul Razak Baginda, was acquitted without his defence being called. Azilah is being held on death row in Kajang prison, but Sirul left for Australia before the Federal Court decision and is being held in an immigration detention centre near Sydney.