Saifuddin: Police Opened Nvidia Chip Diversion Probe in April 2025

SITIAWAN, November 14, 2026 – Police have been investigating United States allegations of Nvidia artificial intelligence chip diversion and illicit procurement involving Malaysia since April 2025, Home Minister Datuk Seri Saifuddin Nasution Ismail said on Saturday.

Speaking to reporters after a MADANI programme in Kampung Sungai Tiram, Sitiawan, Perak, Saifuddin said the claims arose from US allegations that proxy companies in Malaysia were involved, that illicit procurement had taken place, or that Malaysia was being used as a transit country. The investigation is being conducted under the Strategic Trade Act 2010, with the Ministry of Investment, Trade and Industry (MITI) as the lead agency and a MITI-led task force also involved. Regulatory agencies under the Act included Bank Negara Malaysia, the Inland Revenue Board, the Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission and Customs, with the police among them, he said. “Has the police opened an investigation paper? The answer is yes, as early as April 2025,” he said.

Any findings within the police investigation’s scope were being updated to MITI, which had received the US complaint and was responsible for conveying the response to the complainant. “Our investigation is also directed at whether or not Malaysia has become a transit hub. That is the scope of the investigation.” Gathering evidence on the alleged illicit diversion or illicit procurement was a “multi-layered” and “very complex” inquiry, he added, confirming that MITI had been informed of the investigation’s progress. He did not say whether the allegations had been substantiated.

On a separate matter, Saifuddin said the director-general of the Malaysian Border Control and Protection Agency (AKPS), who had been seconded from the police, would be returned to his original force, after which the relevant agency would carry out the necessary processes. He gave an assurance that AKPS operations had not been disrupted, saying the organisation could not come to a halt because its director-general was involved. He had asked the ministry’s secretary-general, Datuk Awang Alik, to give special attention to the present situation. Field reports showed operations were unaffected, he said, and AKPS had recently intercepted a pair of individuals carrying a large amount of cash on the route to Singapore. “If it involves a court process, we will let due process take its course.” The comments follow last month’s announcement that AKPS director-general Datuk Seri Mohd Shuhaily Mohd Zain would be returned to the police. Shuhaily’s lawyers have since said he had yet to receive a formal transfer directive and was still discharging his duties.

Asked about remarks by Agriculture and Food Security Minister Datuk Seri Mohamad Sabu that eligible prisoners should be able to serve under house arrest, Saifuddin said the Home Ministry was “not in a position to comment” on that. As he had told Parliament, anyone convicted after exhausting legal processes up to the Court of Appeal, and who was serving their sentence, had the right to submit a clemency petition, regardless of whether they were “ordinary people, prominent figures, the rich, the poor, VIPs or ordinary citizens”. Once submitted, a petition becomes the responsibility of the Pardons Board, he said. “Whether a clemency petition is discussed, considered and decided upon or not is not within the Home Ministry’s responsibility. But if a decision is made, our duty is to implement it — whether the sentence is reduced, cancelled, the person is freed or placed under house arrest.” Anyone may apply, he said; whether a petition is entertained is another matter. Mohamad, known as Mat Sabu, this week called for a fair house-arrest mechanism for all eligible prisoners after former prime minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak began serving the remainder of a sentence under house arrest.

Saifuddin was in Sitiawan for a RELA MADANI programme in the village where the RELA director-general is from. He said RM500,000 in programme funds, plus RM100,000 under the Sekolah Angkat MADANI allocation, brought the total to RM600,000 for works at Masjid Al-Ismailiah, two surau, a religious school and a national school. A mangrove-planting programme was also completed with a local non-governmental organisation. The programme is in its third year across the ministry’s 11 agencies and has reached at least 33 villages with allocations of between RM500,000 and RM1 million, he said. “Not a single one of the projects we have carried out has been abandoned,” he added, contrasting them with shipbuilding projects in which “sometimes the money is spent but the ship is not completed”. All the programmes were on or ahead of schedule. Only two agencies have yet to complete their programmes, he said: AKPS and ESSCOM, the latter a security agency in Sabah.

Source : Home Minister’s media conference, Sitiawan, November 14, 2026

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