Starvation likely killed Irish teen in Malaysian jungle

SEREMBAN: A vulnerable Irish teen who disappeared from a Malaysian rainforest resort likely starved and died of internal bleeding, with no immediate sign of foul play, police said yesterday.

Nora Quoirin, 15, is thought to have died after about a week in the jungle, and there was no indication she was abducted or assaulted, police said, citing the results of an autopsy.

Her unclothed body was discovered on Tuesday in a ravine in dense jungle following a 10-day hunt involving hundreds of people, helicopters and sniffer dogs.

She went missing from the Dusun Resort, not far from Kuala Lumpur, on Aug 4, a day after checking in for a holiday with her London-based family.

Her family believed the teen, who had learning difficulties, had been abducted but police classified her disappearance as a missing persons case.

Speaking after the post-mortem examination, Negeri Sembilan state police chief Mohamad Mat Yusop told reporters the teen suffered "bleeding in her intestines due to not eating" as well as "extreme stress". He added: "For the time being, there is no suspicion of foul play."

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"There were some scratches on her body," he said, but added there was no indication she was sexually assaulted or kidnapped. "The parents can claim her body," he said.

Her body was airlifted by helicopter out of the ravine - about 2.5km from the resort - and transported to hospital in Seremban town where her relatives identified it.

Medics conducted a long autopsy on Wednesday, starting in the morning and finishing only late at night, as a media pack waited outside the hospital for news.

In a statement released on Wednesday by The Lucie Blackman Trust, a charity that supports relatives of British people missing overseas, her relatives said she was the "heart" of the family.

"She is the truest, most precious girl and we love her infinitely. The cruelty of her being taken away is unbearable. Our hearts are broken," they said. "We will always love our Nora."

Nora had a condition known as holoprosencephaly, where the brain fails to develop normally.

She had limited verbal communication and could write only a few words.

Police questioned witnesses and investigated accounts of a truck heard early on the morning the girl disappeared. - AFP