The former Prime Minister of Malaysia Najib Razak was accused of six more points in connection with his possible involvement in the theft of public funds in the amount of more than 1.5 billion dollars. Thus, he is now charged on 38 counts.
His former Treasury chief, Irvan Serigar Abdullah, was also charged with criminal breach of trust. Both pleaded not guilty to all charges, Reuters reports.
“Nothing in the charges shows that any action I took resulted in any benefit to me,” Najib said at a press conference after the trial. “There should be no belief that any of the money in the charges was lost or that there were any elements of personal interest.”
The new administration, led by Mahathir Mohamad, sought corruption and accused several former high-ranking government officials, including former Prime Minister Najib.
Special attention is paid to how billions of dollars disappeared from the state Fund 1MDB, founded by former Prime Minister Razak in 2009.
Four of the six new indictments relate to the settlement agreement between 1 IDB and the Abu Dhabi state IPIC Fund, said Azam Baki, Deputy Commissioner of the anti-corruption Agency.
In 2017, 1MDB agreed to pay $ 1.2 billion to the Abu Dhabi Fund in a settlement agreement between the two bond payments.
The 1mdb-related charges of Irvan and Najib committed a breach of trust offense with 220 million ringgit of public funds earmarked for the Kuala Lumpur international airport in Berhad, 1.3 billion ringgit earmarked for the subsidy and cash assistance program, and 3.3 billion ringgit of other public funds.
Najib’s lawyer Muhammad Shafi Abdullah said his client personally did not benefit from these transactions.
“These were funds that were originally allocated for a purpose, but were revised in priority, in the face of the urgency and appalling situation in which the country was invested. For the purpose of solving the IPIC problem, the decision must be made very honestly, ” Shafi said in court.
He said the other two charges related to the pipeline project and East Cost Rail Link (ECRL), a $ 14 billion project that has become a Central element of China’s infrastructure in Malaysia.
The project, signed by Prime Minister Najib, was suspended by Mahathir, who said the deal was “unfair” to Malaysia.
