Court returns Shafee's passport temporarily for Aussie trip

Senior lawyer Muhammad Shafee Abdullah today succeeded in getting his passport returned temporarily by the Kuala Lumpur High Court to represent a client in Australia.

This came as High Court judge Collin Lawrence Sequerah allowed Shafee's oral application during case management this morning.

Shafee's passport was kept by the court as a bail condition when he was charged with three criminal offences, including two counts of money laundering involving RM9.5 million that he allegedly received from former premier Najib Abdul Razak.

The lawyer told the court that he only needed for the passport to be released for his travel to the country between Thursday and next Monday.

He also assured the judge that his trip to Australia would not affect the ongoing 1MDB trial against Najib, as he is only scheduled to leave at 9pm Thursday and would be back in the country by Monday, a public holiday.

Shafee said he had to make the oral application for his passport release first, adding that he had just received a CD from Australia containing 1,000 pages of evidence notes for his client's case yesterday evening.

Deputy public prosecutor Ahmad Akram Gharib objected to the application, however.

"My lord, I have strict instruction to object to this application, on reasons that he might be a flight risk," he said.

After hearing submissions by both parties, the judge then allowed Shafee's application.

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