Pakistan may send officials to help investigation

The Bob Woolmer murder investigation in Jamaica may get assistance from Pakistan, with Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz clearing a three-member team to leave for the Caribbean. This was disclosed to Cricinfo by Nasim Ashraf, chairman of the Pakistan Cricket Board, though he added that it depended on the response from the Jamaican authorities.

"The Prime Minister has agreed to our request to send a three-member team to Jamaica to assist in investigations," Ashraf said on Friday. "One diplomat, one PCB official and one senior investigative officer will go. No names have been decided yet."

The move follows reports of dissatisfaction within Pakistan over how the investigation was being handled. PCB officials have been quoted, anonymously, as saying that they believe Woolmer died a natural death. A senior legislator also pulled up the PCB for allowing the players and other officials to be questioned without the presence of lawyers from Pakistan.

On Thursday, Justice Malik Mohammad Qayyum, who led the probe into match-fixing in the 1990s, urged the Pakistan government to send investigators to Jamaica to help with the probe there. "Woolmer was our man. He was our coach and the government must send its own investigation team," Qayyum told AFP.