Heng Pov’s Whereabouts Unknown

The location of former Phnom Penh police chief Heng Pov was un­known Monday to both Cam­bod­ian and Malaysian police, officials and news reports said.

Cambodian officials and news re­ports said over the weekend that Heng Pov had been arrested for a sim­ple visa violation in Singapore in the early hours of Friday and de­ported to Malaysia.

However, Cambodian National Police Commissioner Hok Lundy said Monday that Heng Pov has dropped off the radar.

“We don’t want to comment much,” Hok Lundy said by telephone. “We’ve lost all news of him. We know nothing about him.”

Hok Lundy referred further ques­tions to Keo Vanthan, Interpol’s first deputy director in Phnom Penh.

Keo Vanthan said he had not re­ceived additional information from either the Singaporean or Malay­sian police.

The Malaysian Embassy did not re­spond to e-mailed and telephoned requests for comment.

However, Datuk Fauzi Shaari, di­rec­tor of Malaysia’s federal Crimi­nal Investigation Depart­ment, has asked Malaysian immigration officials to check whether Singapore had indeed sent Heng Pov to Ma­lay­sia, Malaysian newspaper The Star reported Monday.

“There is no request from Cam­bodian authorities to arrest him,” Datuk Fauzi Shaari was quoted as say­ing. “If we receive such a notification, we will do the nec­essary,” he added.

The Star quoted a Singaporean im­­mi­gration spokesman as saying that Heng Pov had been de­ported to Malaysia via the Johor-Singapore Cause­way. “We don’t know if he is still in Malaysia or has left,” the un­named spokesman was quoted as saying.

Cambodian government spokes­man and Information Min­i­ster Khieu Kanharith referred all questions to Interior Ministry spokes­man Khieu Sopheak.

Khieu Sopheak declined to comment on the matter, saying that di­vulging information about the case to the press could be harmful to the case. “Cambodian police officials are doing their work,” he said.