Malaysian court allows former Prime Minister Najib Razak house arrest transfer

A court in Malaysia has cleared the way for jailed former Prime Minister Najib Razak to be transferred to house arrest, Al Jazeera, CNA, The Independent, and Newsday reported on Tuesday. Kuala Lumpur High Court Judge Aslam Zainuddin stated that under the order of conditional pardon, Najib shall serve the remainder of his reduced sentence under house arrest. [1][2][4][5]

The 73-year-old former prime minister was jailed for his role in looting the now-defunct 1Malaysia Development Berhad sovereign wealth fund. Earlier on Tuesday, the Malaysian attorney general sought a High Court review of the house arrest order, according to a Bernama report cited by Yahoo News Singapore. [1][3]

Najib served as the sixth prime minister of Malaysia from 2009 to 2018. He was also the president of the United Malays National Organisation and chairman of the Barisan Nasional coalition during that period. [6]

As FTMQ News reported earlier, Najib is serving a six-year sentence linked to the 1MDB corruption scandal. A royal pardon granted by King Sultan Ibrahim allows him to stay under house arrest until August 2028 after his political party paid a 50 million ringgit fine. [8]