Britain’s Westminster Magistrates Court will open a public investigation into the death of Egyptian tycoon Ashraf Marwan.
The decision comes three years after the incident, in response to requests by Marwan’s family for a public investigation. Earlier investigations by the British authorities had been conducted in secret.
The investigation aims to determine whether Marwan was murdered or whether he committed suicide.
A UK police spokesman declined to reveal the findings of the earlier, unpublicized investigations.
The court is expected to summon a jury to decide on the precise nature of Marwan’s death.
“We suspected foul play from day one,” said Sameh Seif el-Yazal, head of Cairo’s Gomhouriya Center for Criminal Research. “We never bought the suicide story. That is why Marwan’s family assigned a private investigation agency to pursue the case.”
“The private agency found that Marwan’s shoe had been missing from the scene, while other personal belongings of his were misplaced by police,” Seif el-Yazal said.
“Holding secret investigations for such a long period means that the case either involves suspects of different nationalities, or that investigators took a wrong turn in the mistaken assumption that it was a suicide,” he said.
“The court should announce the names of the witnesses and suspects to provide us with an idea of who exactly is involved,” Seif el-Yazal concluded.
Translated from the Arabic Edition.
