Anti-corruption minister Tulip Siddiqui resigned from the UK government on Tuesday after being named in a corruption investigation in Bangladesh, days after her aunt Sheikh Hasina was ousted as the country’s leader.
In a letter to Prime Minister Keir Starmer, Siddiq reiterated that he had done nothing wrong, but said that continuing in office would potentially be “a distraction from the work of the government”.
Siddiq, 42, has been dogged by claims over his links to Hasina, who fled Bangladesh in August following a student-led uprising against her decades-long, increasingly authoritarian tenure as prime minister.
Hasina, 77, has rejected extradition requests from Bangladesh to face charges including mass murder.
On Monday, Bangladesh’s Anti-Corruption Commission announced that he and family members, including Siddiq, were subject to another corruption investigation, this time over an alleged land grab of lucrative plots in a suburb of the capital Dhaka.
Family members, including Siddiq, had already emerged as designated targets of the commission’s investigation into allegations of embezzlement of $5 billion linked to a Russian-funded nuclear power plant.
Bangladeshi money laundering investigators have ordered the country’s major banks to hand over details of transactions related to Siddiq as part of the investigation.
In his resignation letter, Siddiq said that his “family relations were a matter of public record” and that he had acted with “complete transparency”.
He stressed that he “has and will always remain loyal” to the Labor government and the program of national renewal and transformation it has launched.
“Therefore I have decided to resign from my ministerial post.”
Starmer thanked Siddiq for his work and acknowledged that “there has been no evidence of financial irregularities on your part”.
Starmer said: “I appreciate that, to end the ongoing distraction from delivering our agenda to transform Britain, you have taken a difficult decision and want to make it clear how to move forward. The doors will be open for you.”
Siddiq is the MP for the North London constituency, whose ministerial portfolio was part of the Ministry of Finance and was responsible for the UK’s financial services sector as well as anti-corruption measures.
Over the weekend, a Sunday Times investigation revealed details of claims she spent years in a London flat bought by an offshore company linked to two Bangladeshi businessmen.
According to the newspaper, the flat was eventually transferred as a gift to a Bangladeshi lawyer with connections to Hasina, her family and her ousted government.
It also reported that Siddiq and his family were given or used several other London properties purchased by members or associates of the Awami League Party.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
