A man convicted of a politically motivated attack on a Mongolian model and whose body was blown up is fighting to stay in Australia after being released on High Court orders.
Sirul Azhar Umar, 52, a former elite police bodyguard, fled Malaysia to Australia but was convicted in absentia and sentenced to death in late 2014 for the 2006 murder of Mongolian Altantuya Shaariibuu.
Umar was released from Sydney’s Villawood Detention Center in early November after a High Court ruled that indefinite detention was unlawful.
He is one of at least 111 detainees who are allowed back on the streets as a result of the decision – with murderers and a pedophile among the released men.
Umar cannot be deported to risk the death penalty and says he will not seek a pardon because he is innocent.
Sirul Azhar Umar has been released from immigration detention as part of a Supreme Court ruling, but cannot be returned to Malaysia where he faces the death penalty
“I’m not a murderer,” he said The Australian on Friday.
‘I have a family that I love. The people of Australia have nothing to fear from me.’
Despite reports that released prisoners will be under strict visa restrictions and may have to wear electronic ankle bracelets, Umar described himself as a free man not subject to any curfew.
He claimed Home Secretary Clare O’Neil had been assured by Malaysian authorities that he posed no risk to the community and that he wanted to start a new life in Australia, where he had fathered a child.
Shaariibuu told her killers she was pregnant and begged for her life to be spared before she was shot twice in the head and then blown up with military-grade explosives, a court heard in the trial of Umar and police colleague Azilah Hadri.
Umar claims he has been charged with Shaariibuu’s murder and evidence was found in his car and his home, including the dead woman’s jewelry.
He said his only part in the plot was to take Shaariibuu from outside the home of her ex-lover Abdul Razak Baginda in Kuala Lumpur and hand her over to his police superior, Azilah Hadri, who is on death row in Malaysia for her murder.
Mongolian Altantuya Shaariibuu was shot twice in the head and her remains blown up in 2006 in a sensational high-level corruption case in Malaysia
Former Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak was jailed for 12 years for corruption but has denied ordering Shaariibuu’s murder
‘I knew she was going to be killed, but I didn’t do it. Azilah had already told me it was a mission but I didn’t want to be involved,” he said, adding that he had been told Shaariibuu was a spy.
Abdul Razak Baginda was the man responsible for the $1.1 billion purchase of French Scorpene submarines in 2002 for then Defense Minister Najib Razak, who later became Prime Minister of Malaysia.
It was revealed that huge bribes had been paid to Malaysian officials to secure the deal.
Shaariibuu, who sometimes acted as a translator, was allegedly killed to cover up the corruption.
Najib was given a 12-year prison sentence in 2022 over the scandal, but denied any involvement in Shaariibuu’s murder.