The body of English climber missing since 1979 has been found on the Matterhorn peak in the Swiss Alps, police said today.
Police said human bones were spotted by a helicopter pilot on the north face of the Matterhorn in August 2013.
A police team recovered the remains and equipment including an ice-axe.
They checked them against a database of some 280 climbers listed as missing in the region since 1926.
Thanks to DNA tests, experts have finally be able to identify the remains as those of an Englishmen who went missing in December 1979.
Police declined to reveal the 27-year-old man's name, citing Swiss confidentiality rules.
Thanks to technological advances that have boosted search operations, cases of climbers reported missing over recent years rarely remain unsolved.
But as Alpine glaciers melt due to global warming, the remains of long-lost climbers have increasingly emerged from the shrinking mountain ice.
