The French army is worried in Guyana. Since Sunday, a soldier has been missing after accidentally falling from a canoe into the waters of the Oyapock River, on the Brazilian border, we learned Monday from a spokesman for the armed forces in Cayenne.
“Research is still ongoing,” said this communications officer from the Armed Forces in French Guiana.
The accident took place at night
The facts occurred during a mission around 9 p.m., the prefecture announced later on Monday, specifying that the disappeared, canoeman in the 3rd foreign infantry regiment, is also customary chief of the Teko Amerindians of the village of Camopi on the Oyapock River. According to the first elements, the boat hit a tree while operating at night in unfavorable weather.
Three divers were dispatched to Camopi and two helicopters were mobilized, added the prefecture, indicating that the searches carried out on Monday proved unsuccessful and that they will resume on Tuesday.
A policeman also injured
A gendarme, on patrol aboard the same canoe with other soldiers, was slightly injured, the gendarmerie in Paris also indicated.
This is a new blow for the military in Guyana. On March 25, a French policeman, Major of the GIGN Arnaud Blanc, was indeed killed while participating with nine comrades in an operation against illegal gold panning. A man suspected of belonging to a group of clandestine gold mine robbers involved in the death of this gendarme was subsequently arrested.