Côte d'Ivoire skeleton not that of Franco-Canadian journalist Kieffer

“If the DNA had been Guy-André’s that would have shown that he was dead,” Kieffer’s wife, Osange Silou-Kieffer, said after hearing the news. “But there is still some hope this evening, even if there is only a one per cent chance that he’s still alive.”

The skeleton was dug up in Ramaël’s presence near the village of Yaokro, between the towns of Saïoua and Issia, 360 km west of Abidjan on 6 January.

But there were already doubts that it might be Kieffer’s after local people told journalists that it belonged to a black man.

Ramaël’s inquiry is reported to have advanced more quickly since the fall of ex-president Laurent Gbagbo last April.

He has visited the country at least three times since then and was there on Thursday night.

The inquiry is focused on people close to Gbagbo’s wife, Simone, according to Alexis Gublin, the lawyer of Kieffer’s brother, Bernard.

The journalist, who was investigating alleged corruption in the cocoa trade, was due to meet Simone Gbagbo’s half-brother on the day he vanished.