Brussels - Waris Dirie, a Somali-born campaigner against female genital mutilation, turned up safe late Friday in Brussels after Belgian police mounted a search when she failed to show up to receive an award. Dirie, 43, a former fashion model who in 1997 was appointed a UN special ambassador against genital mutilation, had been missing since Wednesday.
Police in the Belgian capital reported that she turned up in good health, but there was no immediate explanation of her disappearance. Authorities had earlier voiced concern that she might have come to harm.
Belgian investigators plan to issue further details about the case on Saturday.
Dirie was last seen at 4 am Wednesday in Brussels, when she had an argument with hotel receptionists before leaving in a taxi. She later missed appointments with European Union and United Nations officials before failing to appear to accept the 2007 Martin Buber Badge at ceremonies Friday in Kerkrade, the Netherlands, on the German border.
Werner Janssen, president of Euriade, a cross-border association that administers the Martin Buber prize, said the argument at the hotel was evidently a result of her becoming lost and not being able to find the Brussels hotel where she was registered.
In March 2004, Dirie suffered minor injuries when a Portuguese stalker broke into her Vienna apartment building and confronted her. The attacker's obsession was apparently unrelated to her human-rights work.
Dirie's best-selling 1999 book, Desert Flower, described her early life in Somalia and the traditional practise of genital mutilation against girls, which she endured herself.
