The whistle-blower website said the two books were, “The Sarawak Report”, penned by the site’s editor Clare Rewcastle-Brown, and “Billion Dollar Whale”, written by journalists from the Wall Street Journal.

Both are due to be published next month.

According to SR, lawyers from Schillings — a London-based law firm — sent a letter to the UK publisher of The Sarawak Report threatening them with “substantial damages” on the basis that the book would repeat “defamatory accusations” about Jho Low made on the website.

This was despite the law firm, according to SR, not having viewed the copy.

According to SR, Schillings went on to claim that no comment should be published about Jho Low’s involvement in the state investment arm until the civil proceedings concerning its asset seizures in the US were completed.

SR has also learnt that the UK publishers of the “Billion Dollar Whale” have also received numerous similar letters over the past few weeks.

Despite the threat of a suit, SR and the WSJ journalists will continue to publish their book in the United States, the SR report said.

“Sarawak Report has not directly received any correspondence so far from Schillings and will continue to publish the book independently in the UK and Malaysia.

“Pre-purchased copies of the book will, therefore, be sent out as pledged and the books will continue to be sold through this website,” the report read.

The news of the alleged attempt to ban the two books comes a day after it was reported that the fugitive businessman hired several politically connected lawyers in the US to defend his interests in a probe by the Department of Justice.

Low — who is wanted in Malaysia for money laundering and has been described in US court filings as the man who siphoned more than US$4 billion from 1MDB — retained former New Jersey governor Chris Christie and one of President Donald Trump’s go-to law firms, Kasowitz Benson Torres, among others.

He has also retained Bobby Burchfield of King & Spalding’s Washington DC office.