Body found 'is Briton missing for 20 years'

A body believed to be that of a British journalist missing for more than 20 years since being kidnapped by Palestinian militants has been recovered in Lebanon.

A military and forensic team excavating a site in the Bekaa Valley in an operation overseen by the British embassy in Beirut dug up the remains of two bodies, one of which is believed to be Alec Collett.

Mr Collett, then 63, was kidnapped at gunpoint in Beruit in March 1985 during the civil war in Lebanon but the following year a radical group claimed to have killed him in retaliation for the US bombing of Libya. A grainy video was released showing a hooded figure said to be Mr Collett hanging from a noose.

The freelance journalist, who lived in New York, was on a United Nations assignment to write a report on Palestinian refugees when he was kidnapped.