KUALA LUMPUR (Dec 3): Datuk Seri Najib Razak took aim at Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) investigating officer (IO) Nur Aida Arifin’s testimony, saying that her assertions were “deranged”, “deluded” and coming from someone “unversed” with diplomacy.

The former prime minister took to the stand to testify in his defence in the 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB)-Tanore trial and referred to Nur Aida’s testimony, in which she had said that Najib’s meeting with PetroSaudi International’s (PSI) Tarek Obaid and fugitive Low Taek Jho (Jho Low) — during a vacation in southern France in 2009 — was a high level government-to-government (G2G) discussion about a 1MDB PetroSaudi Ltd joint-venture, but not conducted through formal official diplomatic channels.

Najib said that he and his family were invited on the RM Elegance yacht in 2009 by Saudi Prince Turki bin Abdullah Al-Saud and Sheikh Hamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, a distinguished member of the Abu Dhabi royal family. Najib said that he was already holidaying in France when the invite came in.

“I categorically deny the accusations made by the prosecution witnesses. The meeting I had with Prince Turki, Tarek and (Jho) Low during the afternoon tea was entirely informal and was nothing like what had been suggested,” Najib said.

"It was, in fact, the first time I had met both Prince Turki and Tarek. The idea that we could have been discussing some sort of sinister plan is not only ridiculous, but entirely unfounded,” he said.

Nur Aida had previously said that Najib should have known that the JV to form 1MDB PetroSaudi Ltd through high-level government-to-government (G2G) discussions had not been done through formal official diplomatic channels, as the discussion on a yacht was not considered formal.

“Najib himself admitted the meeting was a benchmark for G2G discussions, which he promoted to this very day. The vacation by Najib’s family had turned into a discussion on a diplomatic JV without a formal and valid diplomatic channel, resulting in losses to the country,” Nur Aida had said.

Najib rubbished her statement, saying that her suggestion that the meeting was a G2G meeting was not only incorrect, but a “gross misinterpretation of the facts”.

“I strongly refute Puan Nur Aida's baseless testimony. The gathering in question was a private family vacation, during which I received an invitation from Prince Turki to join him for high tea on his yacht,” Najib said.

“This informal meeting was purely social in nature, and did not constitute a government-to-government discussion or any diplomatic or joint-venture negotiation requiring formal channels or the involvement of senior government officials. Having been a politician for 33 years at the time, I am fully aware of protocol and the proper procedures for official engagements.

“The suggestion that this casual meeting was a formal diplomatic discussion is not only incorrect, but a gross misrepresentation of the facts.

“Characterising a social courtesy extended during a private vacation as anything more than that was entirely deluded and deranged that can only come from someone unversed with diplomacy,” he said.

Najib further claimed that he was never asked about this meeting during MACC investigations. And had they asked him about it, he would have explained that he had never had any discussion about the JV when he met Prince Turki.

“Nur Aida is suggesting that I should have declined the impromptu afternoon tea invitation from Prince Turki in the south of France, unless I call and fly in an envoy from the Malaysian mission from either Paris or Rome,” he said.

Najib then said that because he was meeting the prince for the first time at that time, he would not be brave enough to hatch a plot to the extent of 1MDB.

“How can I be brazen enough to hatch a nefarious plot? When you meet someone for the first time, it’s unthinkable that someone would do something like that… My family was around, it was an informal meeting, my family was around in the yacht,” he said.

Najib also said that the conversation could not have been about business, as Prince Turki at the time did not hold any formal position in the Saudi Arabian government.

“I didn’t think anything wrong about the invitation. Surely when you meet someone for the first time, with family, it’s never business. It’s never G2G. How can it be G2G anyway — he (Prince Turki) didn’t have a formal position at that time, he’s [later became] the governor of Riyadh, but not then,” Najib said.

1MDB had paid out US$1 billion for the formation of the JV, where US$300 million went to 1MDB PetroSaudi, another US$700 million to Good Star Ltd, and another RM1 billion (US$330 million) from the murabaha financing agreement in 2010.

Good Star was a company controlled by Jho Low.

In this trial, Najib is accused of four abuses of power and 21 money-laundering charges.

The trial before judge Datuk Collin Lawrence Sequerah continues.

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