April 03, 2008	Thursday	Rabi-ul-Awwal 25, 1429

PANAJI (India): Authorities in India’s resort state of Goa have agreed to allow a federal probe into the murder of a British teenager, an official said on Wednesday.

Scarlett Keeling, 15, was found dead on popular Anjuna beach in February. Her mother Fiona Mackeown has accused authorities in the former Portuguese colony of covering up the killing because of their links to local drug dealers and politicians.

Senior Goa police official Kishen Kumar said that the decision to pass the case to the Central Bureau of Investigation, which Mackeown has long demanded, “was taken consciously by the state government”.

“We have nothing to hide. There is no political pressure on us,” Kumar said.

Police in Goa initially said Keeling drowned after her bruised and partially naked body was found on Feb 18.

But pressure from her mother forced Goan authorities to conduct a second autopsy and treat the case as murder.

Last month, police arrested a bartender and an alleged drug dealer for conspiracy to murder. They said the two gave the girl a cocktail of illegal drugs before one of them repeatedly raped her and left her for dead.

Police have said Keeling was dumped unconscious in shallow water where she drowned, but a forensics report released a week ago suggested she was forcibly held under water.—AFP