North Korea must abide to the provisions of the law set by Malaysia in the process of conducting a post-mortem in the country, said Health Minister Dr S Subramaniam.

He said the cabinet on Wednesday had also decided to continue with forensic process, which was completed on Thursday, because the death of the Jong-nam, the half-brother of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un took place in Malaysia.

"North Korea can reject or show disapproval. But we are doing things according to our law. Something happened in our country. We don't do it according to their law.

"If murder or death (occurs) in our country, there is a process we go through the process. There is no short cut in the forensic study as far as we are concerned," he told reporters after the opening of the Inter-Varsity Sports Fest 2017 in Serdang today.

Dr Subramaniam was commenting on North Korean ambassador to Malaysia Kang Chol's statement yesterday accusing Malaysia of purposely rejecting their claim for the remains of Jong-nam.

Inspector-general of police Khalid Abu Bakar has dismissed North Korea's allegation that Malaysia was purposely delaying the process to release and send home Jong-nam's remains.

Asked whether the bilateral ties between Malaysia and North Korea would be affected, Dr Subramaniam said the relationship between both countries was under the jurisdiction of the Foreign Ministry.

On the post-mortem results, he said: "We will release it once it is ready, and hope to release it within this week. We are currently waiting for the toxicology report, which is an important test to confirm.

"Once it is done, the results will be given to the police as early as we can and it is up to the police to release it. We want to get correct results before releasing it," he said.

Yesterday, Selangor Police chief Abdul Samah Mat said priority to claim the body was accorded to close family members to facilitate identification.

However, to date, only the North Korean embassy here had come forward to claim the remains.

On Monday, Jong-nam whose name was stated as Kim Chol in his passport was reported to have died on the way to hospital after complaining about feeling unwell at KL International Airport 2.

- Bernama