Her father, Dale, is desperate for information that might assist police, and has attacked as almost ''childish'' an inconclusive autopsy report that Croatian authorities took a week to complete.

The two-page report issued late on Monday said there was no evidence of violence on Ms Lapthorne's badly decomposed body, recovered from the sea off Dubrovnik on October 6.

But Mr Lapthorne said a high school student could have written a better summary, and it was nothing more than a physical description of the remains with no mention of any toxicology or forensic testing.

The report also suggested that the poor state of the body might be attributed to it being smashed against rocks by waves, without providing any proof, he said.

''According to the autopsy report as interpreted to us, it cannot be determined whether foul play was involved or not,'' Mr Lapthorne said.

But he suggested the finding was almost meaningless, given the body's advanced state of decomposition and the cursory nature of the autopsy examination.

''Of course, there is no evidence of foul play the body is in such a poor state that nothing can be determined from it without scientific testing or forensic evidence and that hasn't been undertaken at all.''

The judge who ordered the autopsy said yesterday it was impossible to carry out toxicology tests because there was so little soft tissue left when the remains were recovered.

Speaking a day after he was photographed swimming in the same bay where Britt's body was found, Judge Djordjo Benussi confirmed the remains bore no signs of pre-death trauma

The family is pinning its hopes on further tests the Victorian coroner's office has agreed to carry out once the body is back in Australia.

''I've also been offered by the Australian Federal Police the opportunity to have yet another independent pathologist undertake tests, but I am confident in the coroner's office,'' Mr Lapthorne said.