Updated / Friday, 26 Dec 2025 14:33
A court in Malaysia has sentenced former prime minister Najib Razak to 15 years in prison after finding him guilty of abuse of power and money laundering.
“The charges are to run concurrently with each other,” said Judge Collin Lawrence Sequerah.
Najib has also been fined as well as having assets seized.
He was convicted over his role in major embezzlement from 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB) – an insolvent strategic development company – while he was premier.
The 72-year-old was found guilty on four counts of abuse of power and 21 charges of money laundering.
A lawyer for Najib said they would appeal the ruling next week.
Malaysia and US investigators said that at least $4.5 billion (€3.8bn) was stolen from 1MDB, a firm that he co-founded in 2009 while in office.
More than $1bn (€850m) allegedly made its way into accounts linked to Najib, who denied wrongdoing.
“The contention by the accused that the charges against him were a witch hunt and politically motivated were debunked by the cold, hard and incontrovertible evidence against him that pointed towards the accused having abused his own powerful position in 1MDB, coupled with the extensive powers conferred upon him,” Judge Collin Lawrence Sequerah said in his verdict.
The ruling could add to tensions in Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim’s governing alliance, which includes the once dominant United Malays National Organisation (UNMO), over which Najib – its former leader – has retained significant influence.
Najib has been in prison since August 2022, when Malaysia’s top court upheld a verdict convicting him of corruption for illegally receiving funds from a 1MDB unit.
His 12-year jail sentence in that case was halved last year by a pardons board.
Najib last year apologised for mishandling the scandal while in office, saying repeatedly that he was misled by 1MDB officials and Jho Low, a fugitive financier, about the source of the funds.
In his verdict, Judge Sequerah said evidence revealed that the men had an “unmistakable bond and connection”, with Mr Low acting as Najib’s “proxy and intermediary” in 1MDB affairs.
He has been charged in the United States for his central role in the case, denies all wrongdoing and his whereabouts are unknown.
Najib has maintained that he was misled by Mr Low and other 1MDB officials into believing that funds deposited into his account were donations from the Saudi royal family.
But Judge Sequerah said the argument was “implausible” and dismissed letters on the donations produced by Najib that allegedly originated from the Saudi royal family, saying they were not corroborated by evidence and were probably forgeries.
“The irresistible conclusion is that the Arab donation narrative is not meritorious … the evidence pointed unmistakably to the fact that the monies were, in fact derived from 1MDB funds,” the judge said.
The verdict came days after another court denied a bid by Najib to serve his jail sentence under house arrest – a decision that reignited the tensions within Mr Anwar’s ruling alliance.
The UMNO campaigned against Mr Anwar in a 2022 election, but joined his coalition to form a government after the poll ended in a hung parliament.
Some of the organisation’s leaders expressed disappointment with the decision to deny Najib house arrest and others were angered by social media posts by some members of Mr Anwar’s coalition celebrating the earlier ruling.
