Malaysia has requested that Interpol put an alert out to apprehend four North Korean suspects in the murder of Kim Jong-nam, Royal Malaysia Police Inspector General Khalid Abu Bakar said yesterday.
The estranged half-brother of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un was killed in Kuala Lumpur’s main airport last week, in what South Korean and US officials have said was an assassination carried out by North Korean agents.
Khalid yesterday said that two women — one Vietnamese, one Indonesian — arrested last week had been paid to carry out the fatal assault on Kim Jong-nam using a fast-acting poison, but declined to say if they were working for a spy agency.
Photo: EPA
Police are also holding one North Korean man, but are seeking another seven in connection with the murder.
Three of them — a diplomat, a state airline official and another man — are believed to still be in Malaysia.
The other four are believed to have fled Malaysia on Feb. 13, the day of the killing.
‘PROCESS OF THE LAW’
Khalid told reporters that a request had been made to Interpol to put out an alert to apprehend the four suspects, who they believe have already made their way back to North Korea.
Khalid also said the police have sent an official request to the North Korean embassy requesting to interview the embassy’s second secretary and the airline official, having released their names on Wednesday.
“If you have nothing to hide, you should not be afraid to cooperate, you should cooperate,” Khalid told reporters.
Khalid said an arrest warrant would not be issued for the second secretary, as he has diplomatic immunity, but that “the process of the law will take place” if the airline official does not come forward.
Police have yet to receive DNA samples from Kim Jong-nam’s next of kin, Khalid said.
He also denied that Malaysian police had been sent to Macau, the Chinese territory where Kim Jong-nam and his family had been living under Beijing’s protection.
The North Korean ambassador has said the Malaysian investigation cannot be trusted, and the embassy issued a statement on Wednesday saying that the three suspects that have been detained should be released.
CONFRONTATION: The water cannon attack was the second this month on the Philippine supply boat ‘Unaizah May 4,’ after an incident on March 5 The China Coast Guard yesterday morning blocked a Philippine supply vessel and damaged it with water cannons near a reef off the Southeast Asian country, the Philippines said. The Philippine military released video of what it said was a nearly hour-long attack off the Second Thomas Shoal (Renai Shoal, 仁愛暗沙) in the contested South China Sea, where Chinese ships have unleashed water cannons and collided with Philippine vessels in similar standoffs in the past few months. The China Coast Guard and other vessels “once again harassed, blocked, deployed water cannons, and executed dangerous maneuvers” against a routine rotation and resupply mission to
GLOBAL COMBAT AIR PROGRAM: The potential purchasers would be limited to the 15 nations with which Tokyo has signed defense partnership and equipment transfer deals Japan’s Cabinet yesterday approved a plan to sell future next-generation fighter jets that it is developing with the UK and Italy to other nations, in the latest move away from the country’s post-World War II pacifist principles. The contentious decision to allow international arms sales is expected to help secure Japan’s role in the joint fighter jet project, and is part of a move to build up the Japanese arms industry and bolster its role in global security. The Cabinet also endorsed a revision to Japan’s arms equipment and technology transfer guidelines to allow coproduced lethal weapons to be sold to nations
Thousands of devotees, some in a state of trance, gathered at a Buddhist temple on the outskirts of Bangkok renowned for sacred tattoos known as Sak Yant, paying their respects to a revered monk who mastered the practice and seeking purification. The gathering at Wat Bang Phra Buddhist temple is part of a Thai Wai Khru ritual in which devotees pay homage to Luang Phor Pern, the temple’s formal abbot, who died in 2002. He had a reputation for refining and popularizing the temple’s Sak Yant tattoo style. The idea that tattoos confer magical powers has existed in many parts of Asia
ON ALERT: A Russian cruise missile crossed into Polish airspace for about 40 seconds, the Polish military said, adding that it is constantly monitoring the war to protect its airspace Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv, and the western region of Lviv early yesterday came under a “massive” Russian air attack, officials said, while a Russian cruise missile breached Polish airspace, the Polish military said. Russia and Ukraine have been engaged in a series of deadly aerial attacks, with yesterday’s strikes coming a day after the Russian military said it had seized the Ukrainian village of Ivanivske, west of Bakhmut. A militant attack on a Moscow concert hall on Friday that killed at least 133 people also became a new flash point between the two archrivals. “Explosions in the capital. Air defense is working. Do not