Kuwaiti authorities have opened investigations into the deaths of two Sri Lankan women found in separate incidents, registering both as suspected cases of foul play, the Daily Mirror reported on Saturday, citing the Kuwaiti newspaper Arab Times.
In the first case, a Kuwaiti citizen reported finding a Sri Lankan woman, born in 1988, dead inside a storage room on the rooftop of a house in Ali Sabah Al-Salem. After the report was verified, the Ahmadi Public Prosecution was notified and ordered the case registered as suspected foul play, with the body referred to the Forensic Department. The Criminal Investigation Department was tasked with establishing the circumstances of the death.
In a separate incident in Al-Nahda, the body of another Sri Lankan woman, born in 1999, was referred to the Forensic Department on the instructions of the Jahra Public Prosecution, to determine the cause of death and the circumstances surrounding it. The report in that case reached the Operations Room from a Kuwaiti citizen born in 1989. Forensic specialists, medical examiners and detectives were assigned.
Both investigations are continuing.
What is not known
Neither woman is named, and the Daily Mirror’s account gives no occupation, employer, date of death, or length of residence in Kuwait for either. It does not say whether the two cases are connected — the locations, prosecuting authorities and reporting circumstances are all different, which indicates they are not.
“Suspected foul play” is a registration category that triggers a forensic referral in Kuwait. It is not a finding that either woman was unlawfully killed, and no cause of death has been given in either case.
No Sri Lankan authority has yet commented. There is no filing from the Foreign Ministry, the Sri Lanka Bureau of Foreign Employment, or the mission in Kuwait on next-of-kin notification or repatriation, which would ordinarily follow.
Update: a second newsroom confirms the account
Hiru News carried the same report on Saturday afternoon, also crediting the Arab Times, and its account matches on every checkable particular: the two locations (Ali Sabah Al-Salem and Al-Nahda), the two birth years (1988 and 1999), the registration of both deaths as suspicious, the Kuwaiti citizen who made the first report, the notification of the Ahmadi Public Prosecution, the forensic referral, and the assignment of the first investigation to the Criminal Investigation Department.
The agreement is on the detail rather than merely the headline, but both filings trace to the same Kuwaiti newspaper report, so this is two newsrooms relaying one source rather than two independent confirmations. Neither adds a Sri Lankan official response.
Context
Kuwait is among the main Gulf destinations for Sri Lankan migrant workers, a large share of them women employed in domestic work. Deaths of Sri Lankan nationals abroad are normally confirmed to relatives through the mission and the Bureau of Foreign Employment, which also handles repatriation of remains.
Arab Times, the newspaper that carried the original report, is the underlying source for both accounts. It is not among the newsrooms this desk treats as verified for the purposes of its credibility rating, so the Daily Mirror is cited here as the reporting outlet.
Source: Kuwait investigates suspected foul play in deaths of two Sri Lankan women — Daily Mirror, October 24.
