South Africa's ambassador to France, found dead in Paris, left suicide note

PARIS (Reuters) -South Africa's ambassador to France, who was found dead at the foot of the Hyatt Regency hotel in Paris on Tuesday, had left a suicide note to his wife, the Paris prosecutor's office said.

Ambassador Nkosinathi Emmanuel Mthethwa's lifeless body was discovered by a security guard on Tuesday morning in the interior courtyard of the hotel in western Paris, where he had booked a room on the 22nd floor, the prosecutor said.

On Monday evening, his wife had reported her husband missing to the police after receiving a message "in which he apologized and expressed his intention to end his life".

The prosecutor said that in Mthethwa's hotel room the window's safety mechanism had been forced open with scissors - which were left at the scene - but investigators found no signs of a struggle or traces of medication or narcotics.

Initial investigations suggest that this may have been a deliberate act, without third-party intervention, it added. 

South Africa's foreign affairs department confirmed Mthethwa's death, adding that the circumstances were under investigation by the French authorities.

"Ambassador Mthethwa was a distinguished servant of the nation, whose career was marked by dedicated service in critical ministerial portfolios," the foreign affairs department said in a statement, calling his death "a national loss".      

The embassy's website says Mthethwa was South Africa's minister of arts and culture from 2014 to 2019, adding sport to his portfolio from 2019 to 2023. 

(Reporting by Geert de Clercq, Nellie Peyton, Makini Brice, Charlotte Van Campenhout; Writing by Ingrid Melander and Geert De Clercq; Editing by Richard Lough, Alison Williams and Gareth Jones)