In 2015, independent journalist Clare Rewcastle Brown revealed that $700 million had appeared in the personal bank account of Malaysia’s then-prime minster, Najib Razak. The money had come from the 1Malaysia Development Berhad fund (1MDB), which was intended for public development and infrastructure. This was — and still is — the world’s biggest money-laundering scandal, and resulted in a 12-year prison sentence for Razak. But Rewcastle Brown herself has also faced a slew of legal actions, including an arrest warrant and an attempt to place her on Interpol’s Red Notice list of wanted fugitives. However, after years of persistent investigating, Rewcastle Brown was recently awarded the Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani Anti-Corruption Excellence Award. Mongabay podcast co-host Rachel Donald speaks with Rewcastle Brown, the founder of the Sarawak Report outlet, about what led her to investigate the 1MDB scandal, as well as environmental destruction in Borneo. Rewcastle Brown also shares her thoughts on the threats reporters face and how the legal system is used to keep reporters from performing their public service: Listen here: The 1MDB scandal gained widespread international attention after it was revealed, but key players in it remain at large, like Low Taek Jho (a.k.a. Jho Low), the mastermind behind the huge fraud, who is still on the run after befriending some of Hollywood’s most famous celebrities by using the financial windfall to provide the stars with luxury gifts and bankroll 2013’s The Wolf of Wall Street — fittingly enough, a movie about a massive financial fraud.…This article was originally published on Mongabay
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