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Summary Toong pleaded not guilty to the charge in a court in the Malaysian capital in September.
Malaysian prosecutors have dropped a theft charge against a man accused of stealing documents from the Asian Football Confederations (AFC) headquarters in Kuala Lumpur, his lawyer said Thursday.Kong Lee Toong, husband of the AFCs former finance director Amelia Gan, had in September pleaded not guilty to the charge in a court in the Malaysian capital.Kongs defence lawyer Kamarul Hisham Kamaruddin told AFP that prosecutors had decided to drop the charge, but he did not give any reasons.Absolutely, I am happy the prosecutors gave the charge a thorough consideration and decided to withdraw the case, he said.Kamarul said that the defence had earlier written to the prosecution stating that Kong, 35, did not commit any offence.The charge came amid an increasingly bitter battle between Asian footballs governing body and its suspended president Mohamed bin Hammam, who is being investigated by the AFC for what it calls possible corrupt activities.The AFC had lodged a complaint with police over missing documents reportedly relating to bin Hammam, a former FIFA presidential candidate.Bin Hammam, meanwhile, had complained that documents detailing personal payments were stolen from his office, and were included in an internal AFC audit of his activities as president, carried out by PricewaterhouseCoopers.Kee Wei Lon, deputy public prosecutor in the Malaysian attorney-generals office, had previously said that the alleged theft involved a financial document from AFC House and occurred on July 31.Kee could not be reached for comment on Thursday.The AFC had said its internal audit looked into the handling of certain contracts and financial transactions involving AFC bank accountsand bin Hammams personal account during his tenure.It said possible alleged infringements included violations of AFC statutes on ethics, corruption, conflicts of interest, bribery and accepting gifts and other benefits.British media said bin Hammam, who was provisionally suspended from the AFC on the basis of the audit, met AFC-appointed investigators in London in September and offered a detailed explanation of the payments.The 63-year-old Qatari remains provisionally suspended by both world football governing body FIFA and the AFC pending the investigations.Bin Hammam was handed the ban last year after being found guilty by FIFAs ethics committee of bribery during his campaign toreplace Sepp Blatter as the world bodys president. He says the accusations are politically motivated.
