The body of a Beninese tour guide has been found in a national park, the Beninese government said on Sunday, heightening fears that two French tourists who disappeared with him have been kidnapped.
Autopsy results confirmed that the body found on Saturday “was that of the Benin guide of the two French tourists who are still missing,” the Beninese Ministry of the Interior said in a statement.
France said efforts were under way to find the pair, who disappeared in the remote Pendjari National Park on the border with Burkina Faso.
The unnamed tourists and their local guide went missing on Wednesday last week in the wildlife reserve about 550km north of Benin’s economic capital, Cotonou.
The vehicle they were traveling in was found just across the border in Burkina Faso, a security source said on Sunday.
However, there was little more for investigators to go on, the source said.
The four-wheel drive Toyota vehicle “was found without its occupants” and so “the kidnapping theory is being favored,” he said.
The France 24 news channel, citing regional sources, reported that the body of the driver had been found and that he had been shot dead.
A government source said that the body had been badly disfigured by the time it was found on Saturday.
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