Days after North Korean leader Kim Jong Un’s half-brother died after an incident at the Kuala Lumpur International Airport, Malaysian transport minister Datuk Seri Liow Tiong Lai defended the hub’s security to reporters, saying the death “has nothing to do with airport safety,” the New Straits Times reported.
Kim Jong Nam, 45, was getting ready to board a flight to Macau Monday when he was poisoned, possibly by North Korean operatives, according to media reports that broke Tuesday.
“He told the receptionist at the departure hall that someone had grabbed him from behind and splashed a liquid on his face … At this point, he was experiencing a headache and on the verge of passing out,” Malaysian police spokesman Fadzil Ahmat told the Star Online. “He was put on a stretcher and was en route to Putrajaya Hospital when he was pronounced dead.”
The two women suspected of carrying out the attack escaped in a taxi. Government sources have suggested they may have been working for Kim Jong Un, making Kim Jong Nam’s murder into an assassination, BBC News reported.
In any case, Liow was adamant Wednesday that the attack was not at all linked to the the Kuala Lumpur International Airport, which saw more than 48 million passengers last year.
“We have very good airport safety,” he said. “However, I have instructed Malaysia Airport Holdings Bhd (MAHB) to cooperate with the police especially in providing them with necessary information like CCTV recordings.”
The death of Kim Jong Nam came after a rocky few years for Malaysia’s aviation sector. In 2014, two Malaysia Airlines flights went down. MH17 was shot over Ukraine, and MH370 vanished en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing with 239 people on board. Search operations for the still-missing MH370 recently ceased in the Indian Ocean.
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