Former Labour Minister Tulip Siddiq faces an Interpol Red Notice for her arrest and extradition if she fails to attend a court hearing in Bangladesh this month over corruption charges.
An arrest warrant was issued for the Hampstead and Highgate MP in Dhaka on Sunday and she has been given until April 27th to face court and seek bail.
Bangladesh’s Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) told the Daily Mail it will request assistance from Interpol if she does not appear.
It comes after Ms Siddiq broke cover today and claimed she is the victim of a ‘politically motivated smear campaign’.
The former City Minister is accused of pressuring her aunt Sheikh Hasina Wazed, the deposed prime minister of Bangladesh, to allocate three plots of land for the MP’s mother, elder brother and younger sister, all of whom are based in the UK.
The three plots of land were in an exclusive residential development in the north-west of the capital called Purbachal New Town Project.
A court issued an arrest warrant against Ms Siddiq after the ACC submitted a criminal charge sheet against the Labour MP last week.
Bangladeshi authorities have threatened her with an Interpol Red Notice, a request to law enforcement worldwide to locate and arrest a person pending extradition, if she fails to attend a court hearing in Dhaka.
‘Now, if the accused Ms. Siddiq does not turn up and surrender before the court, ACC will follow the global practice of taking assistance from Interpol through Bangladesh Police and Ministry of Home,’ a senior ACC official said.
‘Britain has been a very respected member of Interpol since 1928. Because of non-appearance, the accused would be treated as [a] criminal absconder. Bangladesh, also a member of Interpol, will ask to issue a red alert.
‘The responsibility of the host country of the criminal absconder is to make sure that the accused is arrested and extradited following standard legal procedures.
‘Tulip Siddiq’s lawyers have been formally asked to fight for their clients in the appropriate court of Bangladesh.’
The UK lists Bangladesh as a 2B extradition country which means ministers and judges must be presented with clear evidence before a decision is taken.
Ms Siddiq has accused the ACC of ‘trying to harass’ her. ‘I can’t dignify this politically motivated smear campaign with any comment.’ she told Sky News outside her home today.
‘There is no evidence I’ve done anything wrong.’
Yesterday, Judge Mohamed Jakir Hossain, sitting at the Senior Special Judges’ Court in Dhaka accepted the charge sheet against Ms Siddiq, and issued the arrest warrant against her, as she was deemed a fugitive from the court.
If she does not appear in court on or before April 27th, a trial can start in absentia.
At the same hearing, the court issued arrest warrants against Ms Siddiq’s mother, Rehana, 69, her elder brother Radwan, 44, and younger sister, Azmina, 34, on charges of acquiring plots of land illegally.
Ms Siddiq and her family deny the claims.
The ACC alleges that after the Labour MP’s pressure, Hasina allocated one plot of land each to Ms Siddiq’s mother and siblings in the Purbachal New Town Project, a 6,213-acre residential development in the north-east of the capital.
In total, 16 individuals have had charge sheets submitted against them for corruption relating to the Purbachal project, including six members of Hasina and Ms Siddiq’s family.
Last month, Ms Siddiq’s lawyers sent a letter to the ACC accusing it of launching ‘targeted and baseless’ investigations into her, claiming the corruption allegations against their client are ‘false and vexatious.’
But last week, the head of the ACC, Abdul Momen, said that the Commission will not exchange letters with Ms Siddiq, but let the court deal with the case.
He said: ‘Exchanging letters cannot take the place of a proper court process.
‘A full charge sheet has been prepared after a detailed review of documents. The matter now rests with the court. If she fails to appear after a warrant is issued, she will be treated as a criminal absconder.’
Ms Siddiq resigned as City Minister in January, a month after the Daily Mail revealed that the ACC had launched its corruption probe into her, accusing her and her family members of embezzling up to £3.9billion from a Russian-built nuclear power plant in Bangladesh. Ms Siddiq strongly denies the claims.
It then emerged that Ms Siddiq lived in flats in London that were gifted by British political allies of her aunt, Hasina.
An official inquiry into the controversy found that Ms Siddiq may have misled the public when she told the Mail on Sunday in 2022 that a flat owned by her in London’s King’s Cross was bought for her by her parents.
She later admitted it was in fact a gift by a property developer linked to her dictator aunt.
After her resignation as a Minister, the ACC launched the Purbachal investigation, and another probe regarding a flat she owned in Dhaka since 2002.
Ms Siddiq claimed she transferred ownership of the flat to her sister in 2015, shortly after becoming an MP.
But the ACC claims she did not transfer the flat legally, but merely created a fake transfer document without actually changing the deed to the property.
Last month, inquiries by the Mail on Sunday at the Dhaka Sub Registry Office – Bangladesh’s equivalent of Land Registry – showed Ms Siddiq was still the owner.
However, the Labour MP told the MoS she transferred the flat ‘legally and legitimately’ to her sister under Bangladeshi law.
Ms Siddiq’s lawyers said yesterday: ‘The ACC has made various allegations against Ms Siddiq through the media in the last few months. The allegations are completely false and have been dealt with in writing by Ms Siddiq’s lawyers.
‘The ACC has not responded to Ms Siddiq or put any allegations to her directly or through her lawyers. Ms Siddiq knows nothing about a hearing in Dhaka relating to her and she has no knowledge of any arrest warrant that is said to have been issued.
‘To be clear, there is no basis at all for any charges to be made against her, and there is absolutely no truth in any allegation that she received a plot of land in Dhaka through illegal means.
‘She has never had a plot of land in Bangladesh, and she has never influenced any allocation of plots of land to her family members or anyone else.
‘No evidence has been provided by the ACC to support this or any other allegation made against Ms Siddiq, and it is clear to us that the charges are politically motivated.’