Najib Razak sentenced 12 yrs in jail for 1MDB looting

A court in Malaysia has sentenced former PM Najib Razak to 12 years in jail after finding him guilty on all seven counts in the first of several multi-million dollar corruption trials.

Najib had pleaded not guilty to the charges of criminal breach of trust, money laundering and abuse of power.

The case against him is seen as a test of Malaysia's anti-corruption efforts.

The 1MDB scandal around a state-owned wealth fund in Malaysia has uncovered a global web of fraud and corruption.

It sent shockwaves through Malaysia's political establishment, leading to the toppling of Najib's UMNO party, which had governed the country for 61 years since it gained independence.

Najib, in office from 2009 to 2018, is expected to remain out of prison until appeals are exhausted.

He was sentenced to 12 years in prison for abuse of power, and 10 years in jail for each of six counts of money laundering and breach of trust.

The sentences are to run concurrently.

"After considering all evidence in this trial, I find that the prosecution has successfully proven its case beyond a reasonable doubt," judge Mohamad Nazlan Mohamad Ghazali told the Kuala Lumpur High Court.

Ahead of the hearing, Najib said he would fight on until the end, vowing to appeal against any guilty verdicts against him. "This is my chance to clear my name," he wrote in a statement on Facebook.

What were the accusations?

Tuesday's verdicts centred on 42 million ringgit (USD 10 million) transferred from the fund to the then-prime minister's private accounts.

Najib denies all wrongdoing and says he was misled by financial advisers - in particular fugitive financier Jho Low.

Jho Low has been charged in both the US and Malaysia, but also maintains his innocence.

Najib's defence team argued he was led to believe the funds in his accounts were donated by the Saudi royal family - rather than misappropriated from the state fund.

The charges carried as much as 15 to 20 years in prison each.

What is the 1MDB scandal?

The case centres around the 1 Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB), a sovereign wealth fund set up in 2009, when Najib Razak was prime minister.

Sovereign wealth funds are government-owned investment funds that are used to boost a country's economic development. Built with state earnings, such as revenues from oil resources and exports, they have extraordinary flows of cash to invest and potentially enormous international clout.

In 2015, questions were raised around 1MBD's activities after it missed payments owed to banks and bondholders.

Malaysian and US authorities allege that USD 4.5bn was illicitly plundered from the fund and diverted into private pockets.

The missing money has been linked to luxury real estate, a private jet, Van Gogh and Monet artworks - and even a Hollywood blockbuster, the Wolf of Wall Street.

Last week, US bank Goldman Sachs reached a USD 3.9 billion settlement with the Malaysian government for its role in the multi-billion-dollar corruption scheme.

The deal resolved charges in Malaysia that the bank misled investors when it helped raise $6.5bn for 1MDB.

(Source: BBC)