Missing tourists car found
2003-04-27 22:07
Frankfurt - Algerian police have discovered one of the vehicles used by the 31 European tourists who have vanished without trace in the Sahara desert, Germany's ARD radio reported on Sunday.
Algerian and European officials have thrown a veil of silence over the disappearances, though it is widely believed the adventurers, who were on climbing or overland-motoring holidays, were all kidnapped.
A Frankfurt radio station belonging to the publicly owned ARD broadcasting chain said the vehicle was found one week ago with its caravan superstructure burned out northwest of the town of Illizi.
The vehicle appeared to be the one that a married couple from the German city of Augsburg had taken on a Sahara tour.
Both the German Foreign Office and Interior Ministry declined comment. Fifteen of the missing are Germans. Of the others, 10 are from Austria, 4 from Switzerland, 1 from the Netherlands and 1 from Sweden. No word has been heard from the travellers for two months.
The German news magazine Der Spiegel was set to appear on Monday with a report that Algerian fighting forces were being deployed to the south and that Berlin was worried Algiers might be trying to liberate the tourists by force, with grave risk to their lives.
Spiegel said Berlin was pressing the Algerians to listen to German anti-terrorism experts and use police crisis-management methods rather than military force.
Political analysts said there might be a connection to a reported siege of 300 Islamists near Tebessa in eastern Algeria. The newspaper al-Khabar said Sunday the encircled militants were negotiating for safe passage.
- SAPA