When a relative or friend goes missing abroad it can be very distressing and you may feel at a loss as to what to do about it.

If you are in the UK and worried about a British national who youthink is missing abroad, we can let you know how to produce a missingperson's report for your local police so Interpol enquiries can begin.

Contact the FCO

Contact the FCO in London on 020 7008 1500 or if you are abroad yourself then contact us here.

Although we cannot carry out physical searches on your behalf, wecan give you information about appropriate local authorities. We canalso give you contact details for any relevant local charitable andvoluntary organisations specialising in tracing missing people.

Detective agencies

Where appropriate, we can give you information about the federation or association of any local private detective agencies.

If you want, Consular staff in London can meet familyrepresentatives, maintain contact with you and tell you about any newdevelopments.

What our Consular staff cannot do

We cannot conduct physical searches on your behalf.

We cannot use public funds to finance rescue operations for peoplemissing in remote areas nor pay for the recovery or repatriation of thebody in the unfortunate circumstances where this may be necessary.Costs should be met by relatives or the insurance company.

We cannot control media coverage, in the UK or abroad, although wewill not give out information that is not in the public domain.