Gov't to establish if Jho Low's jet has 1MDB links

The government will have to establish that the jet owned by fugitive financier Jho Low was bought using money stolen from Malaysia, said Prime Minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad.

The prime minister said this when he was asked whether Malaysia had put in a formal request to retrieve the jet from Singapore authorities, who seized the US$35 million Bombardier Global 5000 jet in February last year.

"We will try to get it (the jet) back. We believe that the jet was bought using money stolen from Malaysia.

"We need to establish that the money used to buy the jet was the money that was stolen because he (Jho Low) stole money from Malaysia. So the jet is Malaysia's, same with the boat (Equanimity)."

Dr Mahathir was speaking to reporters after launching the Cardiac Vascular Sentral Hospital in Kuala Lumpur today.

On Tuesday, Reuters reported that the Singapore police had confirmed the jet was parked at the city's Seletar Airport and they had not received any formal request from Malaysian authorities for it.

In June last year, the US Department of Justice (DOJ) had claimed that the jet and the superyacht Equanimity were procured by Jho Low by misappropriating funds originating from 1MDB. 

The Equanimity was seized by Indonesian authorities earlier this year and handed over to Malaysia on Aug 7.  - Mkini