Agnes Callam­ard begins a week-long missio­n to Turkey on Monday­GENEVA: A UN human rights investigator leading an international inquiry into the murder of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi said on Saturday she had made a request to have access to the crime scene in Saudi Arabia’s consulate in Istanbul and to visit the kingdom. Khashoggi, a Washington Post columnist living in the United States, was murdered at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul on October 2 where he had gone to collect documents for his planned wedding. “I have requested access to the Saudi consulate in Istanbul and a meeting with the ambassador of the Kingdom of Saud Arabia in Turkey,” Callamard said in an email. “I conceive of this inquiry to be a necessary step, among a number of others, towards crucial truth telling about and formal accountability for the gruesome killing of Mr. Khashoggi,” Callamard said. In its report to the UN Human Rights Council in June, the inquiry will make recommendations about how to ensure “formal (criminal) accountability”, she said.

Source: The Express Tribune January 26, 2019 15:33 UTC