THE Jamaican police last night confirmed earlier reports that the former Pakistan cricket coach Bob Woolmer was strangled in his room at the Jamaica Pegasus Hotel in Kingston, the capital city on the south-eastern coast of this Caribbean island.

Reading from a prepared statement by Police Commissioner Lucius Thomas, director of communication for the Jamaica Constabulary Force, Karl Angell, said the police are now treating Woolmer’s death as a case of murder.

“Mr Woolmer died as a result of asphyxia due to manual strangulation,” Angell said. “The Jamaica Constabulary Force is making an appeal to anyone with information that can identify Mr Woolmer’s killer or killers to come forward,” the police spokesman told local and overseas journalists at a press briefing last night.

The confirmation came after police received a report from an independent pathologist. But the police said the results of tests on tissue and fluid samples removed from the former coach’s body have not yet been forwarded to them.

Deputy Police Commissioner Mark Shields said there were no signs of forced entry or a struggle inside Woolmer’s 12th floor hotel room, and there was no evidence any of his belongings were missing, suggesting that he was killed by person(s) with whom he was familiar.

“It would take some force because Bob was a large man, and it would take quite a deal of force to subdue him,” said Shields. “It could be one or more persons.”

There were signs of blood, vomit and faeces in the room which was yesterday still being scoured for clues by homicide detectives.

Shields also said the police would be pursuing all avenues, including allegations of match-fixing, as the high-level investigation into the murder proceeded.

“We are ruling nothing out,” Shields said.

Hotel security is also part of the police investigation, but Shields did not offer any information on the content of CCTV footage seized by detectives.

In the meantime, overseas police investigators from Scotland Yard, Pakistan, England and South Africa have all offered to assist the Jamaican police in probing the high-profile murder.

Earlier yesterday, the entire Pakistani delegation was interrogated individually and fingerprinted by police before being whisked to their team bus, which waited at a back entrance to the Jamaica Pegasus Hotel.

The delegation, except for two members, was scheduled to board the bus at 1:00 pm yesterday, en route to the Norman Manley International Airport, where they were due to fly to Montego Bay in western Jamaica. The players were scheduled to be guests at a party held in their honour at the Ritz Carlton Hotel in Montego Bay last night.

Among the two members of the delegation still in Kingston is Murray Stevenson, the team’s physical fitness trainer, who has been asked by Mrs Woolmer to handle her affairs in Jamaica.

The Pakistanis are expected to stay in Montego Bay until tomorrow when they are due to board a flight to Pakistan, via London and Cape Town, South Africa.

Jamaican police, in the meantime, said they were also considering interrogating members of the West Indies and Ireland cricket teams as part of their ongoing probe into the death of Woolmer.

Assistant Police Commissioner Owen Ellington, head of local security for Cricket World Cup, said that since Woolmer’s death security arrangements at the Jamaica Pegasus Hotel had been reviewed and the number of uniformed cops deployed there had been increased.

CEO of the International Cricket Council, Malcolm Speed, dismissed fears that the tournament, which will next week move into the Super 8 stage, would be cancelled due to Woolmer’s untimely demise.

“There has been speculation that the Cricket World Cup will not continue, this is not the case. It’s a challenge for the game to be resolute and finish the World Cup in one piece,” Speed said.