Date:21/03/2008 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2008/03/21/stories/2008032160341400.htm

National

‘Ready to reopen any case involving Britons’

Special Correspondent

PANAJI: The Goa police have offered to reopen any case of suspected death of British nationals for re-investigation on a case-by-case basis provided there is grievance or doubt backed by substantial information or any specific input.

Inspector General of Police Kishen Kumar told The Hindu on Thursday evening that he had conveyed this to Mumbai-based Deputy High Commissioner of Britain Vicki Treadell MVO, when she called on him on Thursday morning at Police headquarters.

He said it was just a courtesy call.

The IGP said that it was not true that the police would reopen on their own some earlier cases of deaths of British nationals in Goa in recent times.

According to Police statistics, British head the list of deaths of foreign nationals in Goa in recent years.

While it is widely accepted that Goa gets a very high number of British tourists, the police has also acknowledged that in several cases of deaths of foreign nationals, the exact cause of the death remains to be ascertained as chemical analysis reports are awaited from the Central Forensic Science Laboratory, Hyderabad.