DNA checks needed for body

A grieving couple may have just received the news they have waited 13 years for - that the body of their son has been found.

Police believe they know the identity of a body found in the Wharerata Forest, southwest of Gisborne, in November. However they need a DNA check to be certain.

Detectives trying to identify the male aged between 20 and 40 have focused on a man who was reported missing in October 1993. His parents have been told but it was not an easy message to deliver.

The couple live overseas in an area police say has no telephone or internet.

They won't say who they are or where they live. Police asked a family friend who was visiting them to collect DNA samples from them.

Mr Scott said there were no definite links to the man, but a forensic pathologist had provided a description that was "in the ballpark" of the man they were focusing on.

"At that time, some inquiries were made into his disappearance, but we were looking at a possibility that he had actually left the country but this is all of course provided that these human remains are actually associated with his disappearance and that's something that we're still a fair way from establishing," he told National Radio yesterday.

When the man disappeared in October 1993, police were given a reason for his departure.

Mr Scott would not say what that reason was, but said that at the time it seemed reasonable. Police had been back in contact with a friend of the man who had reported him missing.