Police in the German state of Lower Saxony on Tuesday said they believe a body found in a farming meadow may be that of a child who disappeared weeks ago.

Police in the town of Rotenburg said they believed that "there is a connection with the six-year-old Arian from Elm near the northern city of Hamburg who has been missing since April."

What we know so far

A farmer discovered the body on Monday afternoon while mowing a meadow in the municipality of Behrste, to the north of Elm, police said.

Arian, a 6-year-old child with Autism, disappeared after being seen leaving his parents' home on April 22, with hundreds of helpers and emergency services searching for the boy for days without success.

The body was found at about 4 p.m. local time (1400 GMT), some 300 meters (about 1,000 feet) from a road in the area where teams had been looking for the missing boy.

Police sent the body to a forensic institute to verify the identity, with a result expected later this week.

Police were said to have several theories about what could have happened to Arian, with the most likely being that he had an accident without any outside involvement.

Emergency services found small footprints at the Oste River, which investigators believed had come from Arian.

Arian was last seen on a Monday evening in late April. A surveillance camera filmed him leaving his parents' home in Elm and running toward a nearby forest, alone.

He had last been seen wearing an orange, long-sleeved sweater, black-dragon-print sweatpants and socks.

rc/rmt (dpa, AFP)