How Altantuya was brutally murdered?

This is a report from Arnaud Dubus, a French reporter based in Thailand, which is published in Liberation French newspaper, March 5, 2009. The English version is as following:

Shaaribuu Setev is a bitter and disappointed man. Yet behind the saddened face of this Mongolian lies a fierce determination. Seated in a sofa in the lobby of an Ulaan Baataar hotel rattled by gushes of a freezing wind, this sixty years old man is ready to fight. His face features, hardened by the suffering and the stern climate, and his intense gaze tell all. “My daughter has been murdered by Malaysians on Malaysian territory. And they did not have even offer a word of apology,” states this professor of psychology at the National University of Mongolia.

The assassination of his daughter, Altantuya Shaaribuu, took place in October 2006. This was a murder unlike others in a region where business conflicts or petty politics are often settled with a gun. Everything in this case, which started in 2002 when the French Spanish company Armaris concluded the sale of three submarines to the Malaysian government for the amount of one billion Euros, is out of the ordinary.

The impact of the “Altantuya case” in France, Malaysia and Mongolia has yet to reach its climax. The murder of the 28 year old Mongolian was the result of a “commission” at the price of 114 million Euros by Armaris to its Malaysian counterpart. This “commission,” which was acknowledged by the Malaysian government in front of the Parliament in Kuala Lumpur, has triggered a chain of events that has led to the assassination of Altantuya and the disappearance of several key witnesses in the case.

A report from the Malaysian Police, written on November 19, 2006 and which has been kept secret until now, reveals dry and precise descriptions as to how this young woman, a member of Asian high society, has been killed. In this document, one of the killers, a policeman of the Malaysian Special Branch named Sirul Omar, replied to the questions of an officer at a police station close to the murder scene. “When the Chinese woman saw that I was taking a gun, she begged me to spare her, saying she was pregnant. Azilah (the commanding officer of Sirul) grabbed her and [threw] her on the ground. I immediately shot the left side of her face. Then Azilah took off her clothes and put them in a black plastic bag. Azilah noticed that her hand was still moving. He ordered me to shoot again, which I did”, said Sirul. This is the first confirmation of Altantuya’s assassins’ identity. “Then we carried her body into the woods. Azilah wrapped the explosives around her legs, her abdomen and her head, and we exploded her.”

The revelation of this report in the French newspaper Liberation is the latest chapter in this colorful and dramatic saga featuring French weapon sellers, Mongolian Shaman, and Malaysian politicians. This case is explosive not only for the Malaysian government, since the deputy Prime minister Najib Razak (who is scheduled to become Prime minister at the end of March) is suspected of having links to the case, but also because it could embarrass the DCNS, this French company specialising in military shipbuilding. The French Spanish company Armaris, which sold two Scorpène and one Agosta submarines to Malaysia in June 2002, was bought by DCNS in 2007.

With her magnetic beauty and sophistication, Altantuya is reminiscent of the troubling image of a Far East Mata Hari. She grew up in Saint Petersburg (Russia), then studied at the Institute of Economic Management in Beijing. Besides speaking English, she is fluent in Russian, Chinese and Korean. The fateful cycle for Altantuya came into gear when she met Abdul Razak Baginda in Hong Kong in 2004. Baginda is a security expert and the director of the Malaysian Strategic Research Centre, a pro-government think tank. The two quickly became romantically involved. Altantuya, nicknamed Tuya by her friends, proved to be a useful assistant, helping Baginda translate from Russian to English.

Whereas Altantuya is young and beautiful, the rich and alluring Baginda is a well known figure of the Kuala Lumpur’s elite, notably because of his proximity to the Malaysian Deputy Prime minister and minister of Defense Najib Razak (he is also his security affairs adviser). Baginda parades in the most exclusive circles of Kuala Lumpur, sometimes accompanied by his legitimate wife.

In March 2005, Altantuya and Baginda departed for Europe, touring France, Germany, Italy and Portugal in the red Ferrari of Baginda, staying in posh hotels and dining in the finest restaurants of the old Continent. This trip, however, was not only for tourism: the contract for the sale of the submarines had been signed in 2002, but important details had yet to be settled. “We knew that Baginda was used by Deputy Prime minister Najib Razak as an intermediary for weapons systems deals, especially the high level ones,” says a regional security affairs expert.

At the end of March 2005 the couple was in Paris, where they met with Najib Razak. A picture shows the threesome in a Parisian private club. “Tuya showed me the pix. She said that one of the men was her boyfriend, Abdul Razak Baginda, and the other the “big boss”, Najib Razak. I asked her if they were brothers because of the names, but she said no, and that Najib Razak was the ‘prime minister’”, said Amy, Altantuya’s best friend (Najib Razak has sworn on the Koran that he has never met Altantuya). According to a private detective, now in hiding in India, the beautiful Tuya was also the occasional mistress of the Deputy Prime minister, who was introduced to her by Baginda at the end of 2004.

The story became dramatic when, in October 2006, Altantuya was informed that the commission paid by the French-Spanish company Armaris had arrived on a Kuala Lumpur bank account. It had been paid to Perimekar, a company owned by Baginda. Altantuya rushed to Kuala Lumpur, in order to claim her share of the commission from Baginda ; she said she was entitled to 500,000 dollars. Baginda and Altantuya broke up prior to this. A jealous Rosmah Mansor, the feared businesswoman and wife of Najib Razak, objected any payment to Altantuya. Altantuya arrived in Kuala Lumpur with two other Mongolian women, one of them was a Shaman responsible for putting a spell on Baginda if he refused to pay. For several days, Altantuya harassed her ex-lover.

On October 18, 2006, Baginda could no longer tolerate the daily scenes made by Altantuya in front of his house. He contacted the Director of the Special Branch, Musa Safrie, who happened to also be Najib Razak’s aide de camp. On October 19, a little before 9 pm, two police officers of the Special Branch, Azilah Hadridan and Sirul Omar, were sent in front of Baginda’s house where Altantuya was gesticulating and shouting. They had the order of “neutralizing the Chinese woman.” They kidnapped her, and drove her ten kilometers away and shot her several times. Then, they destroyed her body with C 4 explosives, a type which can only be obtained from within the Defense Ministry. Her entry into Malaysia was erased from the immigration records. It would appear that Altantuya had never come to Malaysia, because there is no trace left of her.

There is no perfect crime. The taxi driver hired by Altantuya for the day did not appreciate that his passenger was kidnapped under his eyes without payment for the fare. He took note of the registration plate of the kidnapper’s car and filed a complaint at the local police station. In a few days, the police identified the car and realized that it was a government vehicle.

Events unfolded that even the Deputy Prime minister Najib Razak could not impede. He tried to cover the case. A few hours before the arrest of Baginda, he sent him a SMS : “I will see the Inspector General of Police at 11 am today… The problem will be solved. Be cool”. A few hours after, Baginda was arrested as well as the two police officers of the Special Branch, Azilah and Sirul.

After a trial considered dubious by many observers, Baginda was acquitted with the accusation of having ordered the murder and released in November 2008. Accused of having perpetrated the murder, Azilah and Sirul appeared in front of the Court last month. If convicted, their sentence is death. The verdict is scheduled for the 9th of April.

Thousands of miles from there, in the Mongolian capital city Ulaan Baataar, Shaaribuu Setev, Altantuya’s father, is trying to control his anger. To him and his family, the acquittal and release of Baginda is symbolic of the unfairness of the Malaysian judicial process: “The Malaysian government is not even answering to the letters from the Mongolian Foreign Affairs Ministry,” he says.

When Shaaribuu came to the Malaysian parliament to meet Najib Razak, the Deputy Prime minister had to escape through a back door in order to avoid an embarrassing encounter. The Altantuya case has become a key element of the Malaysian political game between Najib Razak (who is expected to become Prime Minister after the United Malay Nation Organisation (UMNO) Congress in March) and the opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim. So far, Najib Razak has navigated around the obstacles, but the murder of the young Mongolian remains a sword suspended over his head.

One of the most obscure aspects of the Altantuya case is the role of the Armaris company. In October 2007, the Malaysian Deputy Defense minister, Zainal Abdidin Zin, acknowledged in front of the Parliament that Armaris had effectively paid 114 million Euros in commission to Perimekar. He maintained that it was not a bribe, but a payment for “support and coordination services.”

Was there corruption as in the case of the Taiwanese frigates in which the French DCNS was also implicated ? DCNS, a private company with public financing, has declined our request for a meeting. “Nobody can comment on this case,” was the sober reply of the DCNS Press relations officer in Paris. A document, which could establish a link between Altantuya and the French company is the guarantee letter written by Abdul Razak Baginda so that his mistress could obtain a visa to enter the Schengen zone (of whom France is a member
country). The French embassy could not refuse this service to a man decorated with the Legion d’Honneur. But the role of Altantuya in the submarines negotiations is still not clear. Intelligence agencies find her background intriguing and the Russian FSB (ex-KGB) is following closely the case.

In Ulaan Baataar, Mungunshagai, the eldest son of Altantuya, who is 12 years old, is traumatized by the death of his mother. Altanshagai, the youngest, who is five years old and mentally handicapped, has not understood that he will never see again his mother. “He is asking for her all the time and is staying the whole day prostrated on his chair. Every evening, I bring him sweets and I tell him that his mother gave it to me for him”, says Shaaribuu Setev, the grandfather of the two boys. As for Baginda, he settled down in the United Kingdom with his family. He never uttered a word of regret on the deadly fate of the one who shared his life for two years.

-Arnaud Dubus (in Kuala Lumpur, Ulaan Baataar and Paris)

The final moments of Mongolian Altantuya Shaariibuu before she was brutally killed in 2006 has been revealed in vivid details in a French newspaper today.

Journalist Arnaud Dubus, who traveled halfway across the world - from Kuala Lumpur to Ulan Bator, Mongolia and finally to Paris - for his investigation, unearthed a piece of documentary evidence exposing how Altantuya was allegedly killed.

The document - said to be obtained from a source in the Malaysian police - has not been revealed during the two-year-long murder trial of Altantuya.

According to a lawyer who was involved in the case, the document which is a caution statement made by an accused in the grisly murder, was not admitted in court.

This was following an Attorney-General’s Chambers directive in 2005 for the prosecution not use caution statements since they are often challenged by the defence arguing that they are obtained through questionable methods, and thus delaying the court process.

In his report which appeared in left-wing Liberation newspaper, Dubus wrote that the document revealed “dry and precise descriptions” on how Altantuya was killed.

Malaysiakini is unable to reproduce all the details of the document due to possible legal complications that could arise as a result of the on-going murder trial.

Last month, Shah Alam High Court judge Mohd Zaki Md Yasin set April 9 to deliver his decision on the fate Sirul Azhar Umar and Azilah Hadri - the two special action force police personnel accused of murdering Altantuya.

The police document obtained by Dubus detailed on how Altantuya, who was referred as ‘the Chinese woman’ in the document, had begged for her life, and stated that she had children, before she was shot.

It also mentioned that Altantuya was shot on the left side of her face, after which her clothes were removed from her body and put in a black plastic bag.

According to the document, Altantuya was shot another time when her hand was seen to be still moving.

Altantuya was subsequently carried into the woods where explosives were wrapped around her legs, her abdomen and her head before she was blown to pieces.

The document clearly identified Altantuya’s killers and the respective roles they played.

Three months of investigation
Dubus told Malaysiakini that he spent three months investigating the case.

“I spent two weeks in Kuala Lumpur, then went to Ulan Bator where I stayed one week. Then, in Paris in January where I spent 10 days,” he said in an email interview.

In his Liberation report, which was written in French, Dubus wrote about Altantuya’s relationship with political analyst Abdul Razak Baginda and the role she played in the purchase of French submarines by the Malaysian government.

“In March 2005, Altantuya and (Abdul Razak) Baginda departed for Europe, touring France, Germany, Italy and Portugal in the red Ferrari of Baginda, staying in posh hotels and dining in the finest restaurants of the old Continent.

“This trip, however, was not only for tourism: the contract for the sale of the submarines had been signed in 2002, but important details had yet to be settled,” wrote Dubus.

“We knew that Baginda was used by Deputy Prime Minister Najib Razak as an intermediary for weapons systems deals, especially the high level ones,” a regional security affairs expert had told Dubus.

Dubus also quoted Altantuya’s cousin as saying that Altantuya and Abdul Razak were in Paris in March 2005, where they met with Najib.

“A picture taken at the end of March 2005 shows the three in a Parisian private club,” he wrote, disputing a denial by Najib that he had ever met Altantuya.

He said that the story “turned dramatic” when in October 2006 Altantuya was informed that the commission paid by the French-Spanish company Armaris - which sold three submarines to the Malaysian government for one billion euros (RM4.7 billion) - had arrived at a Kuala Lumpur bank account.

It was revealed that 115 million euro (RM541 million) commission had been paid to Perimekar, a company owned by Abdul Razak.

“Altantuya rushed to Kuala Lumpur, in order to claim her share of the commission from Baginda; she said she was entitled to US$500,000.

“Baginda and Altantuya broke up prior to this. A jealous Rosmah Mansor, the feared businesswoman and wife of Najib, objected any payment to Altantuya.

“Altantuya arrived in Kuala Lumpur with two other Mongolian women, one of them was a shaman responsible for putting a spell on Baginda if he refused to pay.

“For several days, Altantuya harassed her ex-lover. On Oct 18, Baginda could no longer tolerate the daily scenes made by Altantuya in front of his house,” wrote Dubus.

Subsequently, two police officers from the special unit tasked to provide protection to VIPs including Najib, were asked to “neutralise the Chinese woman.”

It wasn’t a perfect crime

The case was not a perfect crime, said Dubus. Altantuya was kidnapped by the two police officers in front Abdul Razak’s house.

“The taxi driver hired by Altantuya for the day did not appreciate that his passenger was kidnapped under his eyes without payment for the fare. He took note of the registration plate of the kidnapper’s car and filed a complaint at the local police station.

The police were able to quickly identify the car.

“Events unfolded that even the Deputy Prime Minister Najib Razak could not impede. He tried to cover the case. A few hours before the arrest of Baginda, he sent him a SMS: ‘I will see the inspector general of police at 11am today… The problem will be solved. Be cool’.

“A few hours after, Baginda was arrested as well as the two police officers, Azilah and Sirul.”

Abdul Razak was initially charged with conspiring in the killing of Altantuya but he was acquitted without being called to enter his defence.

Dubus said that the case is not only embarrassing to Najib, who is linked to the case, but also DCNS - the French military shipbuilding company which bought over Armaris in 2007.

The 45-year-old French journalist, who is based in Bangkok, has written several books on Southeast Asian history and politics, including a book on the military in Indonesia and Thailand.

According to him, his next book could be on the Altantuya case.