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Malaysian police looking for four North Koreans over Kim Jong-nam killing Malaysian police looking for four North Koreans over Kim Jong-nam killing
(about 4 hours later)
Malaysian police said on Sunday that they were looking for four more North Korean suspects in connection with the murder of the estranged half-brother of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un. Investigators are looking for four North Korean men who flew out of Malaysia the same day Kim Jong-nam, the half-brother of North Korea’s leader, was poisoned at an airport in Kuala Lumpur, according to Malaysian police.
The four hold normal passports, not diplomatic passports. They police say they can not comment on whether they were linked to the North Korean government. Since Kim’s death last week, authorities have been trying to piece together details of what appeared to be an assassination. Malaysian police have so far arrested four people carrying IDs from North Korea, Malaysia, Indonesia and Vietnam.
Police arrested a North Korean man on Friday in connection to the murder of Kim Jong-nam. One of those in custody, an Indonesian woman, told investigators she was duped into thinking she was part of a TV comedy show prank.
Two female suspects, one an Indonesian and the other carrying Vietnamese travel documents, have also been arrested, while a Malaysian man has been detained. On Sunday, Malaysia’s deputy national police chief, Noor Rashid Ibrahim, said four more suspects were on the run. He said the men were North Korean and had flown out of the country last Monday, when Kim died.
Kim Jong-nam died on Monday after being assaulted at Kuala Lumpur international airport, where he was catching a flight to Macau. South Korean and US officials have said he was assassinated by North Korean agents. “I am not going disclose where they are,” he told journalists, adding that Interpol was helping with the investigation.
The police said they are trying to get Kim Jong-nam’s next of kin to assist with the investigation. Noor Rashid showed photographs of the four men, who were travelling on regular, rather than diplomatic, passports and were aged 33, 34, 55 and 57. He said there was a fifth North Korean man whom authorities wanted to question.
More to come Kim was waiting for his flight home to Macau when, authorities say, he was attacked by two women. He sought help at a customer service desk, saying that two unidentified women had swabbed or wiped his face with a liquid and that he felt dizzy, Noor Rashid said on Sunday.
Kim died on the way to hospital after having a seizure, officials say.
Noor Rashid said he expected the postmortem results to be released within days. “We have to send a sample to the chemistry department, we have to send a sample for toxicology tests,” he said.
Investigators also want to speak to Kim’s next of kin to formally identify the body. He is believed to have two sons and a daughter with two women, one living in Beijing and the other in Macau.
“We haven’t met the next of kin,” Noor Rashid said. “We are trying very hard to get the next of kin to come and to assist us in the investigation.”
The case has raised tensions between Malaysia and North Korea. Pyongyang demanded custody of Kim’s body and strongly objected to a postmortem. The Malaysians went ahead anyway, saying they were simply following procedure.
Kang Chol, North Korea’s ambassador to Malaysia, said Malaysia may be “trying to conceal something” and that the postmortem was carried out “unilaterally and excluding our attendance”.
South Korea has been quick to blame its enemies in the North for Kim’s death.
“Considering North Korea has so far committed crimes against humanity and terror acts, we, together with the international community, are closely watching this brutal, reckless incident with serious concerns,” its unification ministry spokesman, Jeong Joon-hee, told reporters.