Excavation of possible burial site for Ben Needham's body begins
A team of officers from South Yorkshire Police will today ( Monday) oversee the excavation of a site where it is believed the body of Ben Needham may have been buried 25 years ago.
Ben went missing on July the 24th 1991 from outside a remote farmhouse his grandad was helping to renovate with local builders. The building is on a narrow farm track in the tiny village of Irakles ( Hercules) where only a handful of people live.
Earlier this month Ben's family was told by officers that they now believe the 21-month-old was killed in an accident with a digger, which was being driven up the track by local businessman Konstantinos Barkas.
The information about what might have happened was revealed by a friend of Mr Barkas after an appeal on the island in May this year, which asked for locals to come forward confidentially.
The man gave detectives from the Operation Ben team enough detail for them to instigate another dig on the island, following the October 2012 operation which saw thousands of tonnes of rubble and earth moved from the land in front of the building.
Mr Barkas died last year aged 62 from cancer.
The new site is behind the farmhouse in an olive grove, just a few hundred yards from where the original dig took place.
Forensic teams will section the area and place a forensic tent over squares of land, before moving on to the next area. An anthropologist will be on hand to determine if any bones discovered are animal or otherwise. If anything is found it will be sent for analysis, which could take a number of days. The whole operation could take ten to twelve days.
A second site earmarked as a possible burial ground may be excavated depending on results at the first dig. No location has been revealed for the second potential area.
South Yorkshire Police say the work will be painstaking and slow, as those involved could be looking for the tiniest fragments to confirm whether Ben was buried there a quarter of a century ago.
The family is bracing itself for the work to begin with a sense of fear and trepidation. In a recent exclusive television interview with Calendar Ben's mum Kerry said the prospect of what might be found is almost beyond comprehension after 25 years of searching.
WATCH: A mum's agony - Kerry talks of finding out son may be dead
In all that time she had the enduring hope that Ben was alive. That hope has been the only momentum in their quest for the truth , but the case has caused their lives to be on hold for a generation.
The family is angry that the new witness did not come forward earlier. If there is confirmation that Ben died that day, they have questioned how anyone could put them through decades of heartache when all their pain could have been dealt with so much sooner.
Ben's grandad Eddie, 68, admits he is in denial about the prospect of finding his grandson and does not believe Barkas, or Dino as he was known, could have been involved. Although he was not a close friend, Eddie did know the driver and described him as a "gentle giant." Eddie even saw the vehicle AFTER Ben had gone missing, and does not remember any marks on the digger indicating an accident.
Barkas did report to Greek Police that he had seen a white car at the bottom of the lane on the day Ben disappeared, in which a woman and two men were sitting. No one else reported seeing this vehicle.
Ben's family will not be on the island while the work in on-going, but will be updated on a daily basis by officers from Operation Ben. The team, which includes two Greek-speaking detectives, was formed in April 2015 after the Home Office granted funding which amounts to about £1m over 18 months. The funding finishes in October.