Brazil: Body found in hunt for missing Greek ambassador

  • 7 years ago
Brazilian police looking for the missing Greek ambassador to the country have found a body inside a burnt-out car.

Kyriakos Amiridis, 59, was last seen on Monday evening, reportedly visiting friends in a Rio de Janeiro suburb. The Nova Iguacu district is described as poor and violent.

A Rio state police official said the ambassador’s Brazilian wife reported him as missing on Wednesday.

The ambassador’s burnt-out rental car was found under a flyover in the neighbourhood and forensic tests are underway to establish the identity of the body inside. But police suspect it is that of the Greek ambassador, television channel Globo reported.

Rio police inspector Evaristo Pontes earlier told the Folha de S.Paulo newspaper that he did not believe the ambassador had been kidnapped.

“We’re following some leads, but not that one. If it had been (a kidnapping), those who took him would have made contact by now,” he said.

Amiridis previously served as Greece’s consul general in Rio from 2001 to 2004.

More recently he was Greece’s ambassador to Libya from 2012 until he took the top Brazil post at the beginning of 2016.

with Reuters