Dead Italian climbers found

The frozen bodies of two of three Italian climbers who went missing in the French Alps five months ago have been recovered close to where they disappeared, mountain rescuers say.

One of the bodies has been identified as that of Damiano Barabino, a 32-year-old cardiologist from Genoa.

Officials said on Friday that they were still working on the identification of the second body. Both bodies were found in ice, one frozen to the mountain face and the other attached by a rope. Barabino had been climbing with Francesco Cantu, a 41-year-old senior heart surgeon from Lecco and their guide Luca Gaggianese, 49, from Milan.

The trio of experienced climbers had successfully completed an extremely difficult ascent of the Barre des Ecrins, a 4 102m peak, before going missing on 26 November in a snow storm on their descent.