Weapons find at dead ambassador’s home
Print Edition
Czech police said yesterday they had found unregistered weapons at the Prague residence of the Palestinian ambassador who was killed by an exploding safe on New Year’s Day.
Czech and Palestinian investigators are probing the death of ambassador Jamal al-Jamal, although police in Prague said it appeared to be accidental rather than a terror attack.
“The blast was the result of inexpert handling of an explosive,” Prague police chief Martin Vondrasek told public radio.
“I can’t say specifically what weapons we have found. We can say they have not been registered in the Czech Republic.”
The website of mass circulation Respekt weekly quoted unnamed police sources as saying Jamal had probably mishandled a bomb hidden in the safe at his Prague home.
It said police had found automatic rifles and other illegal weapons that could arm a 10-man combat unit.
Jamal, 56, who had been in the post since October, suffered fatal injuries to his head, chest and stomach.
His 52-year-old wife was treated for smoke inhalation but discharged from hospital on Wednesday.
Palestinian foreign minister Riyad al-Malki described the blast as “a work accident.”
“The safe was old, and it was made in a way that if it is being opened in a wrong way, an explosive device attached to its door would explode, and this is what happened.
He told Voice of Palestine radio that Jamal had opened the safe “without consulting with anyone” but that no crime had been committed.
But Palestinian embassy spokesman Nabil al-Fahel said the safe was in almost everyday use and “according to our information there was no built-in anti-theft system.”
Jamal, a member of the ruling Palestinian Fatah party of president Mahmud Abbas, served as a diplomat in Bulgaria and Egypt as well as then Czechoslovakia during the communist era.
The Czech Republic is a staunch ally of Israel but Prague has hosted a Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) mission since 1981, when it was the capital of Czechoslovakia.
The mission became an embassy in 1988, but in November 2012 the Czech Republic was one of nine countries which voted against the UN General Assembly move to upgrade the Palestinians’ status to non-member observer state.
“I think the Palestinian administration should explain many questions related to the explosion,” Andor Sandor, former head of Czech military intelligence said.
The blast occurred on the eve of a visit to Israel and the Palestinian territories by US Secretary of State John Kerry to push faltering peace talks.
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