Australian police have launched a manhunt for an armed robber who held up two German women at a remote outback beauty spot then tied them to a tree.
Northern Territory police said the women were bound to the tree for hours not knowing their captor's intentions before eventually escaping unharmed in the middle of the night.
In a case that police acknowledged bore striking similarities to last year's presumed murder of British tourist Peter Falconio, the women were abducted after they had been swimming in Litchfield National Park, about 62 miles south of Darwin yesterday.
A police spokeswoman said the women, a mother and daughter aged 50 and 16, were returning to their vehicle when a man approached them.
The man, who the women had seen following them in his car earlier in the day, then pulled a handgun and bound the women to a tree using cable.
He demanded money then left the women, who managed to escape about midnight and flag down a passerby.
The women were said to be shaken by their six-hour ordeal but had not been physically assaulted or harmed.
AFP