Instead of setting up a task force to investigate Sarawak Report, the whistleblower website's editor Clare Rewcastle-Brown has challenged Deputy Prime Minister Zahid Hamidi to probe the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) instead.
This was because the FBI was investigating the very same thing she had been reporting on.
"I find it very strange that the deputy prime minister and the Umno party wished to somehow vilify and attack me... for revealing something that has now been corroborated by the FBI and other law enforcement agencies the world over.
"So why doesn't Mr (Zahid) Hamidi decide to have a special task force to take on the FBI, why doesn't he criticise the banks who have admitted that there are malfeasance that took place with respect to 1MDB money?
"Why not just take on the force of law and order in other countries, who have identified the crime known as 1MDB," asked Rewcastle-Brown.
She also challenged Zahid to interview her.
"Please do come and interview me. I would be very happy to give you my full mindful about why I am doing what I am doing," she said.
Invited as speaker at anti-graft conference
Rewcastle-Brown said this in a video recording made at the sidelines of the International Anti-Corruption Conference (IACC) which is taking place in Panama City.
She was among three speakers at the IACC session titled "Investigations on Money Laundering" last Friday, where she spoke on 1MDB.
On Saturday, Zahid told the Umno general assembly that a special task force had been set up to probe local organisations, including the Malaysia-focused but London-based whistleblower website.
Zahid claimed that the organisations have allegedly received foreign funding and is under the sway of foreign powers who want to see the present BN-led Malaysian government fall through non-democratic means.
Overseas, 1MDB-linked banks and officials are being investigated by several foreign jurisdictions over alleged complicity in money laundering and embezzlement involving the state fund, which Sarawak Report frequently reported on.
Though Malaysian authorities have dismissed problems with 1MDB as being only consigned to management weaknesses and denied reports of monies being laundered out of the company, accusing the website of trying to destabilise Malaysia and its economy with such news.
Rewcastle-Brown have denied being complicit in any conspiracy to fabricate news to attack the Malaysian government.
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