The government is working to involve a reliable foreign investigator to the investigative team probing the abduction and consecutive murder of Minivan News journalist Ahmed Rilwan, says President Ibrahim Mohamed Solih.
The president stated that this is being done as per the request of Rilwan’s family.
Taking to Twitter on Saturday, the president noted that every day that passes in the absence of justice in Rilwan’s abduction and consecutive murder, brings more suffering to his bereaved family.
The president assured that the government is going every thing in its power to serve justice in connection to the case, despite the challenges and obstacles facing the administration’s work.
Serving justice in Rilwan’s murder case was one of President Solih’s electoral pledges during the presidential elections held in 2018.
Rilwan was last seen purchasing a ticket to the Hulhumalé ferry from capital city Malé, on 8 August 2014. Two years later in 2016, the police had confirmed that Rilwan was abducted and that one of the men caught trailing Rilwan on CCTV footage had been identified as Mohamed Suaid, who was arrested but released by the Criminal Court in November 2014. Him and Aalif Rauf, a brother of one of the suspects in the case had been pronounced dead in battle, after having left to Syria shortly after.
The Presidential Inquiry Commission on Enforced Disappearances and Unresolved Murders, the Disappearances and Deaths Commission during 2019 confirmed that Rilwan was killed by an extremist group.
Saturday marks six years since Rilwan went missing and a biography titled “Gelluvaalee Mausoom Dhivehi Dharieh” translated to “Abducted was an Innocent Maldivian Son” featuring Rilwan’s life was publicized by his family to honor him.