‘Shooting at border criminally motivated'

KUALA LUMPUR - Deputy Home Minister Datuk Dr Wan Junaidi Tuanku Jaafar says he believes that the shooting of a soldier on duty at the Malaysia-Thai border yesterday was criminally motivated.

He said there could be no other reason as the relationship between the army and police of both countries was good.

"As far as I'm concerned, this is a criminal case rather than anything else. Our soldiers are well aware of what's going on there, otherwise they would not have known about the damage to the fence," he said.

It was reported earlier that the 26-year-old soldier was patrolling the N9 area of the border at around 4.30am when he found a breach in the border perimeter fencing.

It is learnt that the victim heard a gunshot from the Thai side as he was taking a closer look at the fence, and he tried to escape. "As of now, the soldier is in a stable condition and the police and the army are investigating."