A dad who devoted his life to trying to find the hit-and-run driver who killed his nine-year-old daughter has now lost his second child 18 years later after she fell to her death from a castle wall.

Elif Emeksiz, 32, was found dead at the bottom of a 50-metre slope near the walls of Alanya Castle, a medieval fortress in the southern Turkish city of Alanya, in Antalya Province, that is popular with tourists, at about 2pm on Sunday, 4th December,

Police and firefighters who reached her body could only note that Elif, who had been reported missing the day before, was dead. Her body has been sent for autopsy.

Her grieving dad, named as Ibrahim Emeksiz, 57, who went to the morgue on 5th December to collect his daughter’s body, said: “She was full of life. I don’t think my daughter committed suicide. It was her walking path. But I don’t know what it is. I’m mourning my daughter, who died 18 years ago. How can I endure this pain now?”

Ibrahim revealed that his other daughter Ebru, 9 at the time, had tragically died in a traffic accident on 18th July 2004.

The grieving dad has spent years trying to find the driver, who fled the scene, even setting up a website, but his search has proved fruitless.

Elif Emeksiz was buried on 5th December next to her sister, with friends and relatives in attendance at the Alanya Municipality Cemetery.