The US Department of Justice has reached a settlement of its civil forfeiture cases against the assets worth $60 million that Riza Aziz acquired using the funds allegedly embezzled from 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB). Including this and other related forfeiture cases, the US will now recover over $1.1 billion that financial criminals had embezzled from the 1MDB.
The 1MDB is Malaysia’s investment development fund that the government created for the benefit of the Malaysian people. Between 2009 and 2015, high-level officials and their associates, including Aziz, of 1MDB misappropriated over $4.5 billion from the 1MDB.
Aziz and others laundered these funds through financial institutions in many jurisdictions including the US. They even used the funds to purchase luxury real estate in New York and London.
