Singapore: former BSI banker jailed over 1MDB issue

A Singapore court jailed Yak Yew Chee on Friday, a former banker who handled Swiss bank BSI's relationship with state investor 1Malaysia Development Bhd (1MDB) for 18 weeks for forgery and failure to disclose suspicious transactions, as Reuters referred.

The 57-year-old Yak, who worked as a senior vice president at BSI Singapore, was also a private banker for Malaysian businessman Low Taek Jho, who was described by Singapore authorities as a key figure in the money laundering investigation linked to 1MDB.

His lawyer argued that the former banker is «truly remorseful» and had cooperated with investigators, and he added Yak had committed the crimes at the instruction of Low, who "was not just my client's biggest customer, but was in fact BSI's biggest customer".
1MDB was founded by Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak; it is currently the subject of money laundering investigations in some countries, including Switzerland and the United States.