PETALING JAYA: The family of Pastor Raymond Koh has welcomed the task force that the government says will be set up to look into his and Perlis activist Amri Che Mat's disappearances.
They hope that with the task force, truth and justice will prevail, and that the perpetrators are brought to justice.
"We want to see the victims released and be reunited with their families," they said in a statement.
They said they hoped the team tasked with investigating the cases would be independent, impartial, professional and credible.
Home Minister Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin had said on Thursday (May 23) that a special task force would be formed to look into the findings by the Human Rights Commission of Malaysia (Suhakam) which concluded that the police were behind the disappearance of activist Amri and Pastor Raymond.
The Citizens Against Enforced Disappearances (Caged) said it was pleased that good sense appeared to have prevailed in the Cabinet and that the Suhakam commissioners' painstaking work was no longer pooh-poohed as being based on hearsay.
In April, Suhakam concluded that both Amri and Koh were victims of forced disappearances, and that the unanimous decision they had arrived at in both cases were made after lengthy discussions and deliberations.
Suhakam said direct and circumstantial evidence in both cases proved on balance of probability that the two men were abducted by state agents, namely the Special Branch of Bukit Aman.
It also urged a special task force to be formed to reopen both cases as enforced disappearances, rather than cases of missing persons.
Amri, the co-founder of non-governmental organisation Perlis Hope, went missing on Nov 24, 2016, after leaving his home in Kangar in an SUV at about 11.30pm.
Pastor Koh, who founded the NGO Harapan Komuniti, was believed to have been abducted by a group of men along Jalan SS4B/10 in Petaling Jaya on Feb 13, 2017, while on his way to a friend's house.
