A Taiwanese woman was found dead in a small town in the southern Czech Republic after she went missing during a tour in central Europe earlier this month.
According to the Southeast Travel Service Co (東南旅行社), the woman, surnamed Huang (黃), joined the company’s 10-day tour to Austria and the Czech Republic.
The tour group checked into a hotel in the Czech city of Cesky Krumlov on the fifth day of the tour, the company said, adding that the tour guide did not arrange any activity for the night and left the tourists in the group to explore the town by themselves.
However, Huang did not return to the hotel that night. The tour guide and a friend of Huang spent the night trying to find her, but failed, the company said.
The tour guide reported to the police the next day that Huang was missing, the agency said, adding that her whereabouts remained unknown even after the tour group returned to Taiwan on March 14.
The company said it was informed by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs that police in Cesky Kurmlov had found a female body and suspected that it was Huang, adding that it contacted Huang’s family and dispatched a representative to accompany them to the Czech Republic to identify the body and handle the funeral.
The company said that official documents had to be translated into English before local police could verify the victim’s DNA and allow the body to be cremated.
The process might take some time because Czech government offices had been closed until Monday due to the Easter holiday, the company said.
“Taiwan’s representative office in Prague was informed about the missing tourist on the evening of March 10 and immediately provided a translator to help the tour guide file a missing person’s report at the local police station,” ministry spokesperson Eleanor Wang (王珮玲) said
Wang said that the office requested the police to continue searching for Huang, adding it was told on March 18 that the police might have found her body.
It then informed the travel agency and Huang’s family about the news, she added.
The company said it regretted what happened to Huang and advised tourists to watch out for their own safety and avoid going out alone at night in places they are not familiar with.
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