Missing French toddler – latest: ‘Only hope is Emile has been taken and is alive,’ Le Vernet mayor says

A local mayor has reflected on the decades-old case of a 3-year-old that went missing in Ganagobie, Alpes-de-Haute-Provence in 1989.

“It reminds us of a lot of things. I sent a little message of support to the mayor of Vernet, François Balique”, Ganagobie mayor Sylvie Belmonte told La Provence, referencing the disappearance of 3-year-old Yannis Moré in May 1989.

“I was town clerk and I took part in the search to try to find little Yannis”, he added.

Yannis had disappeared whilst playing with his three brothers, prompting a search of one hundred gendarmes, soldiers, firefighters and volunteers. However, there were no witnesses, no clues and no suspect.

“We had been settled in Ganagobie for 18 months... I saw them having fun from the window”, Yannis’s mother, Pascaline Moré, told La Provence in 2016. “We give ourselves hope”, she added.

A close family member has spoken of the close-knit family missing two-year-old Emile comes from.

“They always do everything together”, a close family member told La Provence, adding that Emile’s mother is the eldest of ten siblings.

“You know, when you have enough children to form two teams to play ball, there is no need to mix.”

Jean-Marcel, a friend of the grandparents of the missing toddler, said the child could not have “evaporated” from the hamlet, which is used to seeing children playing freely in the street.

“On Saturday night I heard the news on the phone and said to myself that they will find the boy,” the man, a resident of Haut-Vernet, told local network BFM DICI.

“Then afterwards, when 24 hours, 48 ​​hours passed and you realise that a two-and-a-half-year-old can’t evaporate like that, it’s a big worry.”

Two-year-old Emile went missing in Le Vernet, a small mountain village in the Alpes-de-Haute-Provence department and the region of Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur in southeastern France.

It has a population of approximately 100.

The French village of Le Vernet in the Alpes-de-Haute-Provence has dominated headlines following the disappearance of a young boy this weekend.

Émile, aged two-and-a-half, was playing in the garden of his grandparent’s house when he vanished on Saturday afternoon. A desperate hunt –involving helicopters, drones, and sniffer dogs – has been taking place to try and find the missing toddler.

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Since 8am on Thursday morning, gendarmes have been carrying out final searches of the area where two-year-old Emile went missing last Saturday.

With 97 hectares swept across three days, the search will not resume tomorrow unless the investigation uncovers any significant leads that necessitate it.

On Thursday morning, local prosecutor Rémy Avon said in a statement that the search for the toddler had not yielded any clues.

Emile was last seen playing in the garden of a property in Le Vernet in the Alpes-de-Haute department of Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur, with his grandparents notifying the police of his disappearance at around 5.15pm local time on Saturday.

Closed to the public since Tuesday, Le Vernet is expected to remain so for a few days.

The existing decree - in place since Tuesday and expiring on Thursday evening - will likely be renewed over the weekend to “protect families and channel any tourism of curiosity”, mayor François Balique told AFP.

“Until we know the truth, it will be tense. It’s hard on the family, this uncertainty is awful. And the people of the village need to know what happened.”

One resident of Le Vernet, who has lived in the hamlet for over 20 years, has described Emile’s family as “very close-knit.”

“It’s a very good family, very close-knit, very religious”, she told La Provence, describing Emile as a “very sociable child.”

“It’s true that in the hamlet the children walk around, everyone knows them, we always know from which family is such a child”, she added.

Last evening, local prosecutor Rémy Avon said the “physical search” was being called off after four days of an extensive operation in and around the Alpine village.

“The judicial investigation into the causes of the disappearance will continue,” Mr Avon added. “In particular by analysing the considerable mass of information and elements collected over the past four days.”

In the wake of Emile’s disappearance, locals speaking to the media said they are worried their village may be “cursed” while recalling it was the site of a gruesome murder and a devastating plane crash that left 149 people dead.

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