Two Singaporeans have been arrested in connection with the death of a newborn baby in Taiwan two years ago, police in the city state said on Tuesday.
Taiwan had placed a couple from Singapore on its most-wanted list on suspicion of murder after the baby girl was left in a recycling bin in the capital Taipei.
A recycling company employee found the body, with the placenta and umbilical cord still attached, wrapped in a rubbish bag in February 2019.
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Singapore police said in a statement that they had arrested a man and a woman, both aged 25, on April 28 after receiving a request for assistance from Taiwan, adding that they were “working with the Taiwanese authorities to review the evidence and have commenced investigations”.
They did not name the couple but Taiwan prosecutors previously said that Li Heng Xun and Evon Kay Pei Yee were being sought for suspected murder and abandonment.
Singapore couple wanted for murder in Taiwan after baby found dumped in bin
Chen Ju-ping, a spokesman for the Taipei district prosecutor’s office, told local media in February this year that there was “enough objective evidence” for the couple’s arrest.
Taiwanese media earlier reported that the Singaporean couple were believed to have dumped the girl’s body seven days after they arrived in Taiwan and flew back to the city state on the same day. Blood samples retrieved from the bathroom drain in the couple’s hotel room matched the baby’s DNA, police said at the time.
It was unclear whether the self-ruled island had sought the couple’s extradition, but it sometimes faces difficulties in pressing such requests.
The two Singaporeans could either face charges under laws surrounding the disposal of biomedical waste, or more serious charges if the baby is deemed to have been killed.
Additional reporting by Agence France-Presse
