Malaysia police on Monday released sketches of the two suspects in the shooting of Palestinian professor Fadi Mohammad al-Batsh.
The 35-year-old university lecturer who comes from the besieged Gaza Strip was gunned down outside his apartment block on Saturday at about 06:00 a.m.
The perpetrators fled the scene in motorcycles according to police who said 14 bullets were removed from the casualty’s body after an autopsy was conducted on the cadaver.
A recording of a closed-circuit television camera near the scene showed the two assailants waiting for about 20 minutes for the lecturer to emerge from the building police added.
Malaysia’s national police chief Mohamad Fuzi Harun said Sunday that security has been beefed up and an investigation is underway to determine the motive behind al-Batsh’s killing.
“This is an unfortunate incident that we would like to have avoided but it has happened” Fuzi said at a news conference. “I give an assurance that we will do our best to improve the level of security especially in Kuala Lumpur.”
Fuzi said witness accounts showed that the assailants had European features and are about 180-centimeters tall.
Al-Batsh who traveled locally and abroad to speak on Palestinian issues was due to fly to Turkey for a conference when he was killed.
Relatives of the professor have blamed Israel’s Mossad spy agency for the killing.
