UAE ambassdor in US got $66 million allegedly from 1MDB stolen funds

Court investigations in the US reviewed by The Wall Street Journal points to 1MDB diverted funds heading into the accounts of a United Arab Emirates ambassador to the US.

Companies connected to Yousef Al Otaiba, the ambassador, received $66 million from offshore companies

Singapore and US investigators had said the money was misappropirated from 1MDB.

There have been no public disclosures as to the purpose of the transfers, and Mr. Otaiba declined to comment on them, said The Journal.

The Journal also said separately, emails written by and to Otaiba, hacked by a dissident group and leaked to news organizations, include descriptions of meetings between Shaher Awartani, an Abu Dhabi-based business partner of Otaiba, and Jho Low, the Malaysian financier.

The Justice Department says Jho Low the central conspirator in the alleged $4.5 billion 1MDB fraud.

Messrs. Otaiba and Low have been associates since the early 2000s and Mr. Low has described his friendship with Mr. Otaiba in interviews over the years.

The transfers connected to Otaiba are the latest chapter in the 1MDB saga, which grew from a Malaysian fund with debt problems in early 2015 into what investigators have described as one of the biggest frauds in history.

And all this while the Malaysian PM, who is linked to the scandal, walks freely with a smile.