Police examine body on Corniche shoreline

Forensics technicians, uniformed officers and a helicopter were on the scene to examine the corpse, which washed up this morning.

ABU DHABI - 09MAR2011 - A team of police inspecting a dead body on Corniche yesterday in Abu Dhabi. Ravindranath K / The National

ABU DHABI // Police are examining a body that appears to have washed up this morning on a construction area of the Corniche.

The body, that of a Bengali man in his 30s, has not officially been identified, according to police sources. But he was carrying papers that showed his name was Mohammed Borkaih and that he worked for a contracting company, the same source said.

About 14 people, including a forensic team studying and photographing the body alongside uniformed police officers and men who appeared to be labourers, were gathered inside a small security cordon.

The cordon was set up on a tiny construction site along the water where a swimming beach extension is being built across the street from the Abu Dhabi Chamber of Commerce and Industry. The red-and-white security tape was tied to large water pipes stacked there.

There were no onlookers; an officer ushered along passers-by as a police helicopter patrolled the sky overhead.