{"id":92651,"date":"2019-08-28T14:37:11","date_gmt":"2019-08-28T21:37:11","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=92651"},"modified":"2019-08-28T14:37:11","modified_gmt":"2019-08-28T21:37:11","slug":"najib-razak-1mdb-malaysias-former-pm-faces-biggest-trial-yet","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2019\/08\/28\/najib-razak-1mdb-malaysias-former-pm-faces-biggest-trial-yet\/","title":{"rendered":"Najib Razak 1MDB: Malaysia&#8217;s former PM faces biggest trial yet"},"content":{"rendered":"<h2><span style=\"color: #0000ff;\"><em>Courtesy BBC<\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/ichef.bbci.co.uk\/images\/ic\/720x405\/p07lt0j5.jpg\" alt=\"\"\/><figcaption>Media captionFormer Malaysian PM Najib Razak smiles as he arrives in court<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>Former Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak has gone on trial again over an alleged multibillion-dollar fraud involving a government fund.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Mr Najib is facing several trials over the state investment fund 1MDB &#8211; this is the most significant covering 21 counts of money-laundering and four of abuse of power.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Prosecutors say he received and covered up illegal transfers of at least $550m (\u00a3448m) between 2011 and 2014.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Mr Najib has denied any wrongdoing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The former prime minister&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/news\/world-asia-47194656\">first faced trial over different allegations in the 1MDB scandal in April this year<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">What&#8217;s the background to the scandal?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>The 1 Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB) fund was set up in 2009, when Najib Razak was prime minister, to aid the nation&#8217;s economic development.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In 2015, questions were raised around its activities after it missed payments owed to banks and bondholders.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Malaysian and US authorities allege that about $4.5bn was illicitly plundered from the fund and diverted into private pockets.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The missing money has been linked to luxury real estate, a private jet, Van Gogh and Monet artworks &#8211; and even a Hollywood blockbuster.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/news\/world-asia-46341603\">1MDB scandal: The playboys, PMs and partygoers<\/a><\/li><li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/news\/world-asia-22338100\">Najib Razak: The fall of Malaysia&#8217;s former PM<\/a><\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>Opening the trial on Wednesday, prosecutor Gopal Sri Ram accused Mr Najib of being a key player in the scandal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>&#8220;His objective was to enrich himself,&#8221; the prosecutor said, outlining how the money was allegedly funnelled to the former prime minister.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/ichef.bbci.co.uk\/news\/624\/cpsprodpb\/A09E\/production\/_106281114_64b5a7e0-ea3e-462f-8aef-f3f726b19edb.jpg\" alt=\"Anti-Najib demonstrators in Malaysia, November 2016\"\/><figcaption>Image captionThe corruption allegations played a big part in Mr Najib&#8217;s 2018 election defeat<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>Mr Najib was cleared of all wrongdoing by Malaysian authorities while he was prime minister.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Nonetheless, the corruption allegations played a big part in his historic election defeat in 2018 &#8211; and the new government swiftly reopened investigations into 1MDB.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Mr Najib&#8217;s wife, Rosmah Mansor, is facing charges of money-laundering and tax evasion, to which she has pleaded not guilty.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Courtesy BBC Former Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak has gone on trial again over an alleged multibillion-dollar fraud involving a government fund. Mr Najib is facing several trials over the state investment fund 1MDB &#8211; this is the most significant covering 21 counts of money-laundering and four of abuse of power. Prosecutors say he received [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":true,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-92651","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-world"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/92651","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=92651"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/92651\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=92651"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=92651"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=92651"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}