PUTRAJAYA: The Malaysian police were aware of the discovery of temporary transit camps and graves in Wang Kelian, Perlis much earlier than their Thai counterparts, but then Inspector-General of Police Tan Sri Khalid Abu Bakar did not disclose it at the request of his Thai counterpart who wanted to reveal it, the Royal Commission of Inquiry (RCI) was told today.
The 24th witness former New Straits Times reporter Aliza Shah Muhamad Shah, said that on Oct 10, 2015 she had met Khalid at an event and had asked him about the Wang Kelian camps and graves.
“The question posed to Khalid was whether or not Malaysia knew about the camp and graves in January 2015 which was earlier than Thailand who on made the announcement on May 1 that year.
“Before I met Khalid, I contacted him via Whatsapp but he did not reply and when asked on Oct 10, he told me to turn off the recorders before I could ask questions.
“Khalid said he did not reply to me via Whatsapp because he did not want the conversation to be screenshot and spread to others,“ Aliza said.
She said Khalid then went on: “Indeed we found the camps and the graves earlier but there was an agreement with Thailand for them to make the announce first.”
Khalid also requested that his statement not be reported for fear of offending his Thai counterpart.
When asked why she asked Khalid such questions, Aliza said she wanted confirmation because at a press conference on May 25, 2015, Khalid had denied the matter.
Earlier, former New Straits Times Press (NSTP) investigative editor Farrah Naz Abd Karim, told the Inquiry that she had received a letter from the Inspector-General’s Office in 2018 to avoid any follow-up on the settlement camps and graves at Wang Kelian.
She also claimed that the Enforcement Agency Integrity Commission (EAIC) at that time had decided not to investigate alleged police misconduct in the discovery of human trafficking camps and graves in Perlis following a closed-door meeting with police top management.
Farrah said that she received an email from the EAIC asking her to assist in its investigation into possible police misconduct at the Malaysia-Thailand border
This was because of article she co-authored with Aliza that was published on Dec 20, 2017.
The article alleged that the police discovered the human trafficking camps in January 2015, not May 2015 as officially announced which reflected a “coordinated cover-up”.
“The EAIC asked us why we alleged that there was a coordinated cover-up, so we revealed information that was not even published in the report,” she said.
Farrah said after the session, EAIC officials told her that there were enough grounds to conduct an investigations.
“However, I learnt that two days after the session, the EAIC met with the then IGP Tan Sri Mohamad Fuzi Harun in a closed-door meeting. The investigation was called off after the meeting. This I found this out months later when I called EAIC for another follow-up.
The RCI was set up on Jan 29, 2019 to review the findings in the discovery of 139 graves and 28 human trafficking camps in Wang Kelian back on 2015.
The inquiry is chaired by former Chief Justice Tun Ariffin Zakaria.
from Local News http://bit.ly/2Wxld6r
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