Bukit Aman urged to re-open Altantuya death probe

PKR Youth yesterday filed a request with the police for the authorities to re-open the Altantuya Shaariibuu murder case, following the revelations of lawyer Americk Sidhu at last week' Bar Council annual general meeting on private eye P Balasubramaniam's second statutory declaration.

Its chief Shamsul Iskandar Mohd Akin (right), who filed it at the Dang Wangi police station, also urged the police to call on prime minister Najib Abdul Razak, Americk and carpet businessman Deepak Jaikishian and senior lawyer Cecil Abraham to give their evidence.

"I will sent a memorandum to Cecil seeking an explanation from him on what were Najib's directives to him.
"I urge the police to re-open the police investigation papers. They can re-open investigations based on Americk's revelation during the 66th Bar AGM.

Americk had revealed that Cecil acted on Najib's orders to prepare the second SD for the late Balasubramaniam.

In a related development, a NGO submitted a memorandum to the Inspector-General of Police (IGP) also urging the latter to re-open the Mongolian translator's murder investigations in 2006, because of  the latest revelations.

Jihad for Justice, led by its chairperson Thasleem Mohamed Ibrahim, handed over the memorandum to DSP Anuwal Ab Wahab at the Bukit Aman police headquarters yesterday evening.

No follow-up by IGP

Thasleem (second from left in photo) said that the memorandum was a follow up to a letter to the IGP on Feb 21 on the same matter, which he claimed did not receive any response.

He said that he had met Balasubramaniam at a forum in Kuala Lumpur shortly after the latter's return from self-imposed exile in India, and was convinced that the detective was telling the truth about his first statutory declaration on Altantuya's death which implicated Najib.

"Bala's untimely death was a shock to the whole nation and I was quite badly shaken by it," Thasleem said.
He said that he had hoped that Najib would take court action against either Balasubramaniam or Deepak who had made similar allegations implicating him in the murder case.

"When that was not forthcoming, I was even more convinced that the files must be reopened," Thasleem said.

There must be a final closure on this matter and all those including police officers who covered up (on this issue) must be identified, he added.

PKR vice-president R Sivarasa and PKR's Human Rights and Legal bureau deputy chairperson S Jayathas were also present when the memorandum was submitted.

Altantuya was killed on the night of October 18, 2006.