KUALA LUMPUR, Oct 2 — Nepalese Prime Minister Balendra Shah has assured Malaysia of full cooperation to determine the status of 54 citizens still missing after devastating floods and landslides in Nepal, Prime Minister Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim said today.
The update came after one of 55 Malaysians previously listed as missing was located safe and made contact with the Malaysian Embassy in Kathmandu, according to family representatives and official updates.
“I have had conversations with the prime minister. He is willing to give all the cooperation,” Anwar said to reporters this afternoon, adding that Shah agreed during a bilateral call to facilitate administrative and legal efforts to help relatives obtain closure as quickly as possible.
“We have asked the attorney-general to follow through.”
The standard legal procedures in Nepal typically require a three-year waiting period to issue a death certificate for missing persons, compared to six or seven years under Malaysian law, Anwar said.
However, Nepalese authorities have agreed to support expedited court applications.
“He assured me that he will give all the cooperation necessary to facilitate so that the families can get the results as soon as possible,” Anwar added.
Dr Manivannan Rethinam, a spokesman for Malaysia Solidarity: Families in Hope (MASFIH), a group representing the victims’ relatives, confirmed that the Foreign Ministry had officially notified them of the located citizen, who has since returned to Malaysia.
Families of 55 Malaysians still missing in Nepal had sought Anwar’s help to intervene in securing an expedited declaration of death, worried they cannot afford to remain in legal and financial limbo for the seven-year period under existing procedures.
