Renowned Thai pathologist Dr Pornthip Rojanasunand said she is willing to testify at the Teoh Beng Hock inquest if there be an iron-clad guarantee of her safety from the Malaysian government.

"I'm willing to go if there is an official guarantee from the government of Malaysia and the Attorney-General's Chambers on my safety as well as the freedom to perform my professional duty as an independent witness for the Teoh case," she told Malaysiakini yesterday.

azlanOn Sunday, Pornthip revealed that she would pull out from the inquest, citing unspecified political pressure from the Malaysian government.

Pornthip had said she was informed by Thai government officials that their Malaysian counterparts had been giving ‘signals' to the Thai Foreign Ministry that she would not be welcome at the inquest.

The 54-year-old pathologist was subsequently advised by the Thai authorities not to take the stand at the inquest.

Pornthip, a civil servant attached to Thai Justice Ministry, has apparently been under pressure from the Thai authorities to withdraw from the Teoh inquest in order not to imperil ties between Malaysia and Thailand.

She was scheduled to testify on April 20 and was expected to be quizzed on her findings involving Teoh's second autopsy.

Pornthip had accepted the Selangor government's invitation to help probe the cause of Teoh's death on a pro bono basis.

It was after she was followed by unidentified men when she was in Malaysia for the second post-mortem last November that she felt undue pressure was being put on her.

Her concern was heightened when, in January, a police report was made against her for allegedly leaking the findings of the second post-mortem.

"I accepted an invitation from the Selangor government as a volunteering independent expert because I considered it as a case where a fellow human being has suffered," aid Pornthip.

"However, what I have encountered while trying to conduct my work in Malaysia has given me a very uneasy feeling."

'Informal signals'

Following her decision not to come to Malaysia to testify at the inquest, both Home Minister Hishammuddin Hussein and Attorney-General Abdul Gani Patail took pains to assure Pornthip of her safety.

Hishammuddin also vowed that the police would investigate Pornthip's claims of political pressure and urged her to provide further details.

Asked to elaborate on the alleged ‘informal signals' sent by Malaysian authorities to their Thai counterparts, Pornthip said: "I was told by the Thai authorities from different ministries that certain authorities in Malaysia are not happy with me."

NONEShe again expressed hope that her involvement in the Teoh inquest would not affect her on-going investigations in southern Thailand where thousands have died in a Muslim separatist insurgency. Pornthip said her work on cases in southern Thailand requires her to go to Kelantan.

"Investigations on issues of the south Thailand conflict can benefit both Malaysia and Thailand and I think it should not be linked to the Teoh Beng Hock case."

According to Pornthip, her team needs permission from the Malaysian authorities to enter the country to conduct an investigation on a southern Thailand conflict issues.

In January, her team had applied for entry to Kelantan but the application was rejected.

Pornthip, however, stopped short of requesting the Malaysian government to allow her to conduct the southern Thailand conflict investigation in Kelantan.

"Let's focus on Teoh Beng Hock case first," she said.

Reaction to Nazri's accusation

Teoh, the 30-year-old political secretary to Selangor executive councillor Ean Yong Hian Wah, had been summoned to the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) office on the 14th floor of Plaza Masalam in Shah Alam on July 15 last year to be quizzed over alleged irregularities in the disbursement of state funds.

He was found dead the following day outside the building, on the fifth floor exterior landing.

Pornthip had participated as an observer in the second post-mortem after Teoh's body was exhumed last November in the wake of her earlier explosive testimony - based on photos taken from the first post-mortem - that the deceased could have been strangled before falling from the building.

She has also claimed that there was a 80 percent chance that Teoh could have been murdered.

The second post-mortem was done by Dr Shahidan Md Noor, the head pathologist from the Sungai Buloh Hospital, in the presence of Pornthip, representing the Selangor government and Dr Peter Venezis, the British pathologist hired by the MACC.

Shahidan testified last month that according to the second post-mortem, it was not possible Teoh was strangled. Venezis is scheduled to testify on April 26 and 27.

Pornthip also said that she was not perturbed by Minister in the Prime Minister's Department Mohd Nazri Abdul Aziz calling her a "liar".

"I don't take such criticism seriously. After all, I am a Buddhist and as such, I'm selfless."

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