VALLETTA (MALTA) (ITALPRESS/MNA) – An office at the Office of the Prime Minister in Valletta was inspected on Saturday as part of court-ordered visits linked to the ongoing Yorgen Fenech murder trial. The office was in use in 2019 and has since been occupied by four different chiefs of staff, the government said.
It was among several locations mentioned by witnesses during the proceedings and later identified for access following a request to Judge Edwina Grima.
The Office of the Prime Minister said the court had ordered that no reporting take place until all inspections and views ordered over the previous two days had been completed.
The OPM stressed that the government was “completely extraneous” to the facts being discussed in the trial.
It said, however, that it had fully cooperated with the court, providing logistical and security arrangements and any other assistance requested.
The inspection of Auberge de Castille brings the Prime Minister’s Office back into focus in a trial that has repeatedly examined events and individuals linked to the highest levels of government.
The building featured prominently in testimony by Keith Schembri, who served as then Prime Minister Joseph Muscat’s chief of staff when investigative journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia was assassinated in October 2017.
Schembri has been among the key figures to testify about the political and administrative environment surrounding events before and after the assassination.
The Fenech trial has repeatedly examined meetings, communications and relationships involving people who worked at or had access to the Prime Minister’s Office during that period.
The court-ordered inspections form part of the evidentiary process in what has become one of Malta’s longest murder trials.
The OPM said it was issuing its statement only after the reporting restriction had expired and all ordered access had been completed.
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