ADDIS ABABA, Sept 21 (Reuters) - A lion ate a local man in eastern Ethiopia after escaping from a game park, police said on Sunday.

Staff at the Metehara sugar factory ventured into a nearby cane plantation last week to search for a missing worker.

"They came upon a lion and the field was soaked with blood," a police spokesman, Commander Demsash Hailu, told Reuters.

"The lion escaped but they found the missing man's head."

He said they suspected the big cat had strayed from the Awash Game Park, some 225 km (140 miles) east of the capital Addis Ababa. Ethiopia's national symbol is the rare black-mane lion, which is on the currency and often depicted in statues. (Reporting by Tsegaye Tadesse; Writing by Daniel Wallis; Editing by Myra MacDonald)

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