The Anti-Corruption Commission on Sunday detected assets of former land minister Saifuzzaman Chowdhury Javed in five more countries, including India, Vietnam and Malaysia.
Besides, a Chattogram metropolitan special judge court ordered the Police Headquarters to seek an Interpol red notice against Saifuzzaman and his wife Rukmila Zaman in a money laundering case.
The commission found the information on Saifuzzaman鈥檚 assets in the five countries after it seized 23 sacks of documents related to the former minister鈥檚 assets, including evidence of alleged money laundering and illegal overseas property purchases.
ACC deputy director for public relations Atarul Islam said that the commission seized the trove of documents, including the documents on Saifuzzaman鈥檚 properties in India,聽 Thailand, Malaysia, the Philippines and Cambodia.
Earlier, the commission identified 582 assets of Saifuzzaman in the United Kingdom, the United States, Dubai of the United Arab Emirates and Singapore.
A joint team that included the ACC recovered the sacks from the house of Osman Talukdar, a neighbour of Saifuzzaman鈥檚 wife Rukhmila Zaman鈥檚 driver Md Iliyas Talukder.
The documents which were taken away from Aramit Group鈥檚 Kalurghat industrial facility on September 16, were allegedly hidden by the driver of former United Commercial Bank chairperson Rukmila Zaman鈥檚 car.
The documents were first kept at driver Ilias鈥檚 house at Shikalbaha union under the Karnaphuli police station and later moved to a neighbour鈥檚 house shortly before a raid was carried out on September 18.
At about 4:15am of Sunday, the joint team recovered the sacks from the house of Osman.
The seizure was conducted in the presence of police, acting union parishad chairman and local people.
Moshiur Rahman, deputy director of the ACC head office, said, 鈥榃e have seized a trove of documents in the operation. We have not been able to verify all of them yet. We can get more information after verification.鈥�
The seized documents include records of assets purchased in different countries, income tax papers, rent receipts and other financial information, according to officials.
ACC officials said that two officials of Aramit PLC, a family-owned company of Saifuzzaman, were arrested on Wednesday night in a graft case.
Later, the two accused, Abdul Aziz and Utpal Pal, were placed on remand in police custody for questioning with the court鈥檚 permission.
On July 24, the commission鈥檚 deputy director, Moshiur Rahman, filed the case with integrated district office in Chattogram, accusing the former minister, his wife, siblings, and 31 others of embezzling and laundering Tk聽25 crore from UCB.
Based on information from the two arrestees, investigators searched the house of driver Iliyas from late Saturday night, leading to the recovery of the documents.
Utpal Pal, AGM accounts at Aramit PLC, was described by investigators as Saifuzzaman鈥檚 designated officer in charge of acquiring and managing assets abroad.
抖阴精品 staff correspondent in Chattogram reported that Chattogram metropolitan special judge (acting) Md Abdur Rahman on Sunday ordered the Police Headquarters to seek an Interpol red notice against Saifuzzaman and his wife Rukmila in a money laundering case.
The court passed the order after the ACC filed a petition on September 18 seeking the red notice to restrict the couple鈥檚 international movement and attempts to transfer or dispose of their overseas assets in connection with the case filed against Saifuzzaman and 31 others of embezzling and laundering Tk聽25 crore from UCB.
ACC public prosecutor advocate Mokarram Hossain said that the court order cleared the way for police to forward the application to Interpol.
Now the order will be sent to the Police Headquarters, from where Interpol will be formally requested to issue a red notice against the couple, he added.
According to the case, Saifuzzaman and his family opened five shell companies in the names of Aramit officials. Through one of the entities, they applied for a 180-day repayable 鈥榯ime loan鈥� at United Commercial Bank, owned by the family, for import of wheat, chickpeas, turmeric and peas.
After sanctioning of Tk 25 crore, the funds were diverted into accounts of the other four shell entities before being siphoned abroad, the ACC said.
The ACC stated that one such shell firm, Imperial Trading, was opened in the name of arrested official Abdul Aziz. Part of the laundered money was deposited into that company鈥檚 bank account.
The commission said the fraudulent transactions occurred between 2019 and 2020, when Saifuzzaman was serving as the land minister.
On March 5, a Dhaka court ordered the ACC to freeze 39 bank accounts of Saifuzzaman and his family, which together held Tk 5.26 crore in deposits.
In a separate order, the court directed the seizure of shares worth Tk聽102 crore and 957 bighas of land owned by the accused.
Saifuzzaman served as state minister for land from 2014 to 2018 and as land minister from 2019 to 2023 during the Awami League regime which was ousted on August 5, 2024, in a mass uprising.
Just before a few days before the fall of Awami League government, Saifuzzaman along with his wife and family members left for London.
Several other cases also filed against Saifuzzaman and his wife for corruption allegations while the filing of three more cases were also approved against him on Sunday by the ACC.
