Reports: French cops issue arrest warrant for countryman in Malaysia over child kidnapping case

PETALING JAYA: French police have issued an international arrest warrant for one of their citizens said to be living in Malaysia for his alleged role in the abduction of an eight-year-old girl in eastern France, according to multiple news reports.

Rémy Daillet-Wiedemann, 55, is said to be a conspiracy theorist with links to far-right groups who allegedly played a role in the abduction of Mia Montemaggi last week on the request of her mother Lola Montemaggi.

Both Lola and Mia were found in a disused factory at the border border village of Sainte-Croix in Switzerland on April 18, five days after Mia was allegedly taken from her grandmother’s home in the eastern Vosges region by three men posing as child protection officers.

Lola had lost custody of Mia in January, was banned from seeing her and was suspected of having arranged her kidnapping.

Custody of Mia was given to her maternal grandmother after Lola reportedly told a family judge she wanted to "live on the margins of society".

Lola is under arrest in Vaud, western Switzerland and is awaiting extradition to France while Mia has been reunited with her grandmother, reported The Guardian.

Four men have been detained so far over the kidnapping.

French prosecutor François Pérain said that their investigations led them to believe that Daillet-Wiedemann played a role in organising the abduction.

According to a BBC report that quoted French media, Daillet-Wiedemann was a former local politician who stood with the centrist Democratic Movement in Haute-Garonne, in south-western France.

He was later expelled from the party but gained popularity within the online conspiracy movement for his videos calling for a "popular coup d'état".

The French Embassy declined to comment on the case.