1MDB has cleared $678.96 million in debts

KUALA LUMPUR: State fund 1Malaysia Development Berhad has cleared over 3 billion ringgit ($678.96 million) in debt over the past two years, Prime Minister Najib Razak said on Wednesday, amid ongoing money-laundering probes linked to 1MDB in at least six countries.

The sovereign wealth fund, founded by Najib, is at the centre of civil lawsuits filed by the US Department of Justice that allege more than $3.5 billion was misappropriated from 1MDB. The fund is also being investigated in Switzerland and Singapore.

Najib’s premiership was rocked by a series of reports by the Wall Street Journal since mid-2015 tracing how over $1 billion of 1MDB funds were transferred into his personal bank accounts.

Najib, who had chaired 1MDB’s advisory board until it was dissolved in May last year, has denied all allegations of corruption, saying that he has never received any funds from a state agency or fund for his own benefit.

The government has said that most of the funds transferred to the prime minister’s bank account had been gifted by a member of the Saudi royal family, and had subsequently been returned. Encouraged by the inability of the country’s fractured opposition to capitalise more strongly, Najib is expected to call an early general election this year as he seeks to put the scandal to rest. — Reuters