Malaysia receives autopsy report on murdered lecturer

By Rasha Khalaf

CAIRO

Malaysian police on Tuesday received an autopsy report from the Health Ministry about the death of a Palestinian lecturer, who was assassinated in the capital Kuala Lumpur last week.

“After completing the autopsy, we submitted our findings to the police and it is up to the police to release any details on the report,” Health Minister Subramaniam Sathasivam said in statements cited by the local newspaper New Straits Times.

The minister refrained from disclosing details of the report, citing the case was still subject to investigations.

“We will not release any statement (on it),” he said.

On Saturday, Hamas-linked Palestinian lecturer Fadi Mohammed al-Batsh was shot dead near his home in the Malaysian capital by two gunmen, who fled the scene unscathed.

While al-Batsh’s family has accused Israel’s spy agency Mossad of killing the lecturer, Israeli Defense Minister Avigdor Lieberman has denied involvement in the assassination.

Malaysian Deputy Prime Minister and Home Minister Ahmad Zahid Hamidi earlier said: “the government was always monitoring foreign agents, but this was sometimes made difficult when they use passports which have diplomatic relations with Malaysia”.

He said the Home Ministry has spotted foreign agents including those from “a country in the Middle East” using passports of such countries to conduct “certain missions”.

Malaysia has no diplomatic relations with Israel.

On Monday, Malaysian police published two sketches of the suspects behind the lecturer’s assassination.

The police said the suspects could be from the Middle East or Europe and are well-built.

Israel is widely believed to have killed numerous Palestinian resistance activists in the past, many of them overseas.

In 1997, Mossad agents tried -- and failed -- to kill Hamas political chief Khaled Meshaal in Jordan by spraying poison into his ear.

Mossad is also believed to have been behind the assassination in 2010 of top Hamas commander Mahmud al-Mabhuh in a Dubai hotel.

Israel has never confirmed or denied its involvement in Mabhuh’s murder.