D-G: Kim Jong-nam was attacked outside passport check area

PUTRAJAYA: Kim Jong-nam, the half-brother of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, is believed to have been assassinated before he could have his passport checked at the KLIA2 departure hall.

Immigration director-general Datuk Seri Mustafar Ali (pic) said the place where Jong-nam is said to have been poisoned was outside the immigration check-point area.

"This is all that I can tell you. I'm not at liberty to talk much about the case because it is under police investigation. We have been helping the police and any information on the incident must come from them," he said Wednesday.

Jong-nam is believed to have been attacked by two women with liquid poison just before he was to take a flight to Macau on Monday.

The women later got into a taxi and fled.

Mustafar also declined to say if Jong-nam had entered Malaysia on a fake passport or why the one he carried had a different name on it.

"That is for the police to investigate. We have given all the information to them so that they can pursue the matter," he said.

Inspector-General of Police Tan Sri Khalid Abu Bakar had said on Tuesday that the dead man was travelling on a passport that identified him as Kim Chol.

Kim Chol was the name of the vice-minister who was executed on the order of Jong-un in 2012.