Miss Peru 'mistaken for prostitute' by African president

Miss Peru has sparked an international incident after allegedly being mistaken for a prostitute by Gabon's president.

Beauty queen Ivette Santa Maria says she had been offered an all-expense paid trip to an exotic African nation, lucrative sponsorship deals and a chance to be the star promoter of a new beauty contest.

She said after arriving at Gabonese President Omar Bongo's palace "he pressed a button and some sliding doors opened, revealing a large bed."

She added: "I told him I was not a prostitute, that I was a Miss Peru. I started to cry and panicked."

Miss Santa Maria stressed that the president never touched her, nor tried to stop her from fleeing and was probably not involved in what she calls a scheme by would-be pageant organisers who lured her to the West African nation.

Peru's UN ambassador in New York contacted his Gabonese counterpart "and expressed the Peruvian government's serious concern over the events", Peru's Foreign Ministry said in a statement.

Peru's Foreign Minister Manuel Rodriguez told reporters that his office was awaiting a response from Gabon's UN ambassador.

A spokesman for Bongo, Vincent Mavoungou Bouyou, said by telephone from the Gabonese capital, Libreville, that he was unaware of the allegations.

Miss Santa Maria said she received a phone call several months ago from an Argentine woman claiming to be a publicist working on the launch of a new Miss Humanity beauty pageant in Libreville.

She says she was offered £800 for a week's work, a suite in the Inter-Continental Hotel and the possibility of sponsorship deals with companies such as Air Gabon.

Santa Maria said she arrived in Libreville with her boyfriend on January 19 but was taken alone to the presidential palace. She took a lift that opened into a wood-panelled room. Bongo came down shortly afterward. "I felt silly because I couldn't communicate with him, not speaking French," she said.

She said she fled the room and was running around the palace grounds when guards offered to drive her back to her hotel. When the car took a different route, she feared she was being abducted and jumped out.

Back at the hotel, pageant organisers and government officials apologised for "any misunderstanding," Santa Maria said. But she said it took until Friday to settle her hotel bill, and she left Gabon for South America soon after.