Three People Detained So Far Over Death Of Kim Jong-Nam

KUALA LUMPUR, Feb 17 (Bernama) -- Two foreign women and a local man have been detained so far as police try to get to the bottom of Monday's alleged assassination of Kim Jong-nam, the estranged elder half-brother of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un. The identity of the dead man, who had carried a passport bearing the name Kim Chol, was officially confirmed as Jong-nam by Deputy Prime Minister Ahmad Zahid Hamidi. Police at 2am Thursday detained a second female suspect who was in possession of an Indonesian passport bearing the name Siti Aishah, with Feb 11, 1992 and Serang, Indonesia stated as the date and place of birth. The Inspector-General of Police Khalid Abu Bakar said that also detained was a 26-year-old Malaysian man said to be her boyfriend. He was arrested in Ampang at 6pm Wednesday. The Indonesian embassy here has sought the permission of the Foreign Ministry to meet the woman bearing the Indonesian passport to verify her identity. The first female suspect, who was arrested at KL International Airport 2 (klia2) at 8.20am Wednesday, was in possession of a Vietnamese travel document. It bore the name Doan Thi Huong, with May 31, 1988 and Nam Dinh cited as the date and place of birth. The two women were remanded for seven days from Thursday, according to Selangor police chief Abdul Samah Mat. The remand order was made at the Sepang district police headquarters. Last Monday, Jong-nam was reported to be at klia2 to board a flight to Macau when a woman suddenly covered his face with a cloth laced with poison. Jong-nam, who was using the name Kim Chol, was reported to have died on the way to hospital. Meanwhile, the Chemistry Department said it had received for analysis several samples from the police probing Jong-nam's death. The director of the department's Forensics Division, Dr Cornelia Charito Siricord, said the samples were received Thursday evening and would be analysed as soon as possible. In another development, two Malaysian police officers paid a brief visit to the North Korean embassy in the Malaysian capital Thursday afternoon, presumably to meet ambassador Kang Chol over the case. They entered the compound of the embassy at around 12.50pm and left about 15 minutes later without divulging anything to reporters. Selangor police chief Abdul Samah noted that security had been tightened at entry-exit points like the KL International Airport and klia2 to prevent other suspects in the case from fleeing the country. A Bernama check at klia2 found the terminal busy, with local and foreign travellers coming under the watchful eyes of security personnel. At the National Institute of Forensic Medicine at Kuala Lumpur Hospital, local and foreign journalists were seen waiting for the latest developments in the case which has attracted international attention. A post-mortem was done on Jong-nam's body Wednesday. -- BERNAMA