Search for missing Ben is extended at new site

DETECTIVES searching for missing toddler Ben Needham on the Greek island of Kos are extending their stay for ‘two to three days’ to continue exploring a second site.

Officers have begun looking at the second search area about half a mile from where Ben, then aged 21 months, was last seen in 1991, and where police began digging last month.

Detective Inspector Jon Cousins said initial work at the new site revealed the underlying ground is compacted material deposited over the past 30 years.

Now officers, who are investigating claims Ben may have been accidentally run over by a digger driver while on holiday, will be ‘lifting all the earth’ at the site.

Det Insp Cousins, who updated Ben’s mother Kerry yesterday, said: ‘I have to know that when I leave Kos, I can tell the family that we’ve done everything we can to find out what happened to Ben.’