Italian mountaineer falls prey to Himalayas

The Indian army recovered the body of Dalla Longa Marco, 45, on Wednesday and rescued other climbers from the blizzard-hit region using a helicopter, said G S Martolia, superintendent of police.

"Marco was reported missing early this week after blizzards hit the upper Himalayan ranges," Martolia told The Associated Press by phone from Uttarkashi, 200 kilometres northwest of Dehradun, the capital of Uttaranchal state.

"Other team members have abandoned their plan to scale the peak and were returning to New Delhi with Marco's body," he said.

Separately, an Indian porter accompanying German and Austrian climbers died in a snowstorm in the nearby Kalindi mountain range on the India-Tibet border earlier this week, he said.

The state government has asked all mountaineers to return to their base camps following heavy snowfall and blizzards in the region, said Dilip Kumar Kotia, a state government official.