IGP: Police have not given up efforts to bring back Jho Low

The police have not given up on their efforts to bring fugitive businessperson Low Taek Jho, who is accused of masterminding the 1MDB fund, inspector-general of police Abdul Hamid Bador said.

“I would still work towards this goal. I admit that I had failed, but that doesn’t mean the efforts to bring him back have stopped,” Hamid (above) was quoted as saying in an interview published by The Star.

He reiterated that the police knew where Jho Low was hiding, but admitted that the force still faced constraints in bringing Low back to Malaysia.

Hamid said the police had reached out to their counterparts there but they refused to acknowledge the fact.

“There is a recent foreign news report that claimed Jho Low is supposedly in Kuwait but it was actually in 2016.

“If he is really brave, then he should come out of his hiding place,” the IGP said in throwing a challenge to the fugitive.

Last week, Low was reported by the Wall Street Journal as travelling to Kuwait, evading international arrest notices issued by authorities in the US and Malaysia, who are seeking him for his link to the 1MDB scandal.

In February, the Hamid revealed that intelligence services found that Jho Low had visited Wuhan, China, which was the epicentre of the Covid-19 outbreak.

Low (above) and former prime minister Najib Abdul Razak have been charged with misappropriating millions of ringgit through 1MDB and its former subsidiary SRC International.

International investigators, including the US Department of Justice, have concluded that at least US$4.5 billion (RM19.25 billion) was misappropriated from 1MDB.

In January, Low denied being the mastermind behind the problematic 1MDB, saying that he only acted as an intermediary for deals involving the company.

He has also hinted that he had been offered asylum by a country in Europe last year, "based on political persecution".

Besides Low, Hamid said the police would also not give up on their hunt for former SRC International Sdn Bhd managing director and CEO Nik Faisal Ariff Kamil and several others.

Low, Nik Faisal, Eric Tan Kim Loong, Casey Tang, Jasmine Loo and Geh Choh Heng are among those wanted by the authorities since 2015 to assist in the 1MDB scandal investigation

- Mkini