|
 Najib has denied taking any money and said the corruption
allegations are part of a malicious campaign to force him out of
office.
The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported last week that investigators
probing 1MDB had traced funds flowing into Najib's personal account
when he was campaigning for a general election over two years ago.
"We can confirm that a number of officials from the task force,
conducting an enquiry into 1MDB, visited our offices today," 1MDB
said in a statement.
"They were provided with a number of documents and materials to aid
with the investigations currently taking place."
A police spokeswoman confirmed the raid, but did not give any
further details.
1MDB, a property-to-energy group whose advisory board is chaired by
Najib, has debts of around $11 billion.
Even before the WSJ report it was the subject of separate
investigations by the central bank, auditor general, police and the
parliament's Public Accounts Committee.
 The Wall Street Journal report, citing documents from a government
investigation, said there were five deposits into Najib's account.
The two largest transactions, worth $620 million and $61 million,
were made in March 2013 during the election campaign, the paper
said. It said they came from a company registered in the British
Virgin Islands via the Singapore branch of Falcon Private Bank.
Reuters has not independently verified the WSJ report.
Singapore's central bank said on Wednesday that it would provide
assistance to Malaysia and share information where it was legally
able to.
Falcon Private Bank, a Swiss private bank owned by Abu Dhabi
sovereign wealth fund International Petroleum Investment Company,
said it was already in contact with the Monetary Authority of
Singapore and would be fully transparent with the authorities.
On Tuesday, the Journal released what it said were government
documents from the probe of the prime minister, detailing a money
trail that it said led to his personal bank account.
The Attorney-General Abdul Gani Patail, who is part of a special
task force probing 1MDB, said the documents were already the subject
matter of an investigation.
A task force investigating 1MDB said it had frozen half a dozen bank
accounts this week in relation to the allegations. But Abdul Gani
said that the freeze order did not involve any bank accounts
allegedly held by Najib.
LEGAL COURSE
The furor surrounding 1MDB and the ensuing political crisis have
spooked financial markets.
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The ringgit is trading at a 16-year low against the dollar and has
weakened past the old currency peg of 3.80 per dollar, fixed in
September 1998 during the Asian financial crisis and scrapped in
2005.
The benchmark stock index dropped to its lowest in a week. 1MDB
bonds also took a hit following the raid. The 4.4 percent 2023 bonds
are trading down 2 points at 82 cents on the dollar.
In a statement on his Facebook page after the raids, Najib said that
he has instructed his lawyers to send a letter to the Journal.
"Accusations by the Wall Street Journal are malicious and supported
by certain quarters in the country with the purpose of forcing me to
quit as prime minister and president of UMNO," said Najib, referring
to his party the United Malays National Organisation.
Najib's law firm, Hafarizam Wan & Aisha Mubarak said in a statement
it had been instructed to consider action against the Journal.
A spokeswoman for Dow Jones & Co., which publishes the Journal,
said: "We stand behind our fair and accurate coverage of this
evolving story."
Opposition lawmakers have pressed cabinet ministers for a full
explanation into the allegations, and asked him to go on leave until
a probe is completed.
Members of Najib's UMNO party have closed ranks behind the prime
minister, who had already been on the back foot over alleged
mismanagement of 1MDB and his handling of the economy.
"I think the cabinet was very united in that we have to allow for
due process to take its course," Khairy Jamaluddin, the youth and
sports minister, told reporters after a cabinet meeting in
Malaysia's administrative capital Putrajaya.
1MDB has described the allegations as "unsubstantiated", saying it
never provided funds to the prime minister.
(Additional reporting by Emily Chow, Al-Zaquan Amer Hamzah and
Ebrahim Harris in KUALA LUMPUR; Umesh Desai in HONG KONG; Writing by
John Chalmers and Praveen Menon; Editing by Rachel Armstrong and
Jeremy Laurence)
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