{"id":370917,"date":"2025-12-26T09:16:12","date_gmt":"2025-12-26T09:16:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/370917\/"},"modified":"2025-12-26T09:16:12","modified_gmt":"2025-12-26T09:16:12","slug":"court-finds-malaysias-former-pm-najib-razak-guilty-of-abuse-of-power-corruption-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/370917\/","title":{"rendered":"Court finds Malaysia\u2019s former PM Najib Razak guilty of abuse of power | Corruption News"},"content":{"rendered":"

DEVELOPING STORYDEVELOPING STORY, <\/p>\n

Malaysian high court finds former PM Najib guilty in trial related to the 1MDB sovereign wealth fund scandal.<\/p>\n

Published On 26 Dec 202526 Dec 2025<\/p>\n

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Former Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak<\/a> has been found guilty in his second major trial involving the multibillion-dollar 1MDB scandal.<\/p>\n

The ruling was handed down by the Kuala Lumpur High Court on Friday, where Najib, 72, was found guilty on four counts of abuse of power regarding the illegal transfer of about 2.2 billion Malaysian ringgit ($539m) from Malaysia\u2019s 1MDB sovereign wealth fund.<\/a><\/p>\n

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\u201cThe prosecution, I find, has thus proven its case against the accused beyond a reasonable doubt in respect of the first charge,\u201d Judge Collin Lawrence Sequerah said.<\/p>\n

\u201cI therefore convict the accused of the first charge,\u201d the judge said.<\/p>\n

Najib faces 21 additional counts of money laundering and the ruling was still under way at the court on Friday. Each charge carries between 15 and 20 years imprisonment.<\/p>\n

Prosecutors accused Najib of abusing his position as prime minister, finance minister and 1MDB advisory board chairman by moving large amounts of money from the sovereign wealth fund to his personal accounts more than a decade ago.<\/p>\n

The scandal first exploded in Malaysia in 2015 and Najib was later found guilty and sentenced in 2020 to 12 years in prison for misappropriating about $9.9m in 1MDB funds. His sentence was later commuted to six years<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"Malaysia'sMalaysia\u2019s former prime minister Najib Razak in 2022 [File: Ahmad Luqman Ismail [EPA]<\/p>\n

This latest trial, Najib\u2019s second, was widely considered the most significant to date because it directly involved 1MDB entities and much larger sums of money.<\/p>\n

The marathon legal proceedings have spanned seven years and saw lawyers call 76 witnesses to the stand, including Najib himself.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe trial has had a lot of delays, and it\u2019s a very complicated thing to understand,\u201d said Bridget Welsh, an honorary research associate with the University of Nottingham Asia Research Institute Malaysia.<\/p>\n

\u201cThese financial crimes are multi-layered, and it\u2019s been a long, extensive process,\u201d Welsh told Al Jazeera.<\/p>\n

Najib apologised last year for mishandling the 1MDB scandal, but during his recent trial maintained that he had been led astray by the fugitive Malaysian financier Jho Low, who has been wanted by Interpol since 2016.<\/p>\n

Judge Sequerah said on Friday that evidence indicated Najib had an \u201cunmistakable bond and connection\u201d with Low, who served as the prime minister\u2019s \u201cproxy and intermediary\u201d, Reuters reported.<\/p>\n

The judge also challenged Najib\u2019s defence that he mistakenly believed some of his ill-gotten funds were \u201cdonations\u201d from the Saudi royal family, Reuters said.<\/p>\n

Despite the scope of the charges against him, Najib is still popular among some supporters of the United Malays National Organisation (UMNO).<\/p>\n

The UMNO headed Malaysia for six decades from 1957 until 2018, when the party finally lost power following the 1MDB scandal.<\/p>\n

The Asia Research Institute\u2019s Welsh told Al Jazeera that the outcome of Najib\u2019s trial will demonstrate the strength of political accountability in Malaysia, particularly for its senior leaders.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is a test of Malaysia\u2019s judiciary, and it\u2019s a test of political will to allow this to continue, especially given that the party involved is also part of the government,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"DEVELOPING STORYDEVELOPING STORY, Malaysian high court finds former PM Najib guilty in trial related to the 1MDB sovereign…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":370918,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[1204,1532,4,450,37948,3071,7905,451,1205,3,452,453],"class_list":{"0":"post-370917","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-breaking-news","8":"tag-asia-pacific","9":"tag-banks","10":"tag-breaking-news","11":"tag-breakingnews","12":"tag-corruption","13":"tag-crime","14":"tag-financial-markets","15":"tag-headlines","16":"tag-malaysia","17":"tag-news","18":"tag-top-stories","19":"tag-topstories"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/370917","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=370917"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/370917\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/370918"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=370917"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=370917"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=370917"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}