Aruba weighs charges against Joran van der Sloot following Natalee Holloway confession

Authorities in Aruba are reportedly weighing the possibility of leveling new charges against Joran van der Sloot since he confessed to murdering Natalee Holloway on the island 18 years ago, officials said.

Van der Sloot, 36, told US investigators earlier this month that he bludgeoned 18-year-old Holloway to death on an Aruban beach and disposed of her body in the ocean in May 2005.

While the statute of limitations on murder in Aruba expires after 12 years, the question of whether island prosecutors will bring new charges against the former suspect “cannot be answered with a straightforward yes or no” because van der Sloot was still a minor when the crime occurred, Ann Angela, spokesperson for the Public Prosecutor’s Office of Aruba, told Fox News Digital.

“It depends on various factors within the investigation,” Angela continued.

“As it is an open investigation, the Public Prosecutor’s Office will only provide limited information to the media, also about the issue of the statute of limitation.”

Holloway’s infamous disappearance is “still an open investigation in Aruba,” Angela noted.

“We have requested the U.S. Department of Justice for all the documents related to the investigation, which we will review before deciding on the procedural steps to be taken against Joran van der Sloot. Up until now, even though we are indeed aware of the reports in the press, we have not yet been formally informed by US authorities,” she explained.

The Public Prosecutor’s Office did not immediately respond to The Post’s request for a comment on their progress in the case.

Natalee Holloway vanished on the final night of her senior class trip to Aruba on May 30, 2005.

The Alabama resident was last seen leaving a bar with van der Sloot, then 17, who subsequently became the prime suspect in her disappearance.

He was arrested multiple times over the years alongside his friends Satish and Deepak Kalpoe, Fox News Digital noted.

The Aruban authorities also questioned his father, Paulus van der Sloot, several times before he died suddenly in 2010.

In early October, van der Sloot finally confessed that he kicked Holloway in the head and smashed her face in with a cinder block when she rebuffed him on the beach.

The startling confession was part of a plea agreement he struck with US prosecutors as part of the case against him for attempting to extort $250,000 from Holloway’s family in 2010.

In an Alabama court last week, Van der Sloot pleaded guilty to taking money from the desperate loved ones before leading their investigator on a dead-end journey and decamping to Peru – where he later murdered 21-year-old Stephany Flores exactly five years after Holloway was last seen.

The father of one was hit with a 20-year sentence for extorting and defrauding the Holloways – which he will serve concurrently with his 28-year rap for killing Flores at Peru’s Challapalca.

Van der Sloot hates the conditions at Challapalca, which is high in the mountains and known for freezing temperatures and lack of cell phone service, his lawyers previously told Fox News Digital.

Over the years, van der Sloot told multiple stories about what allegedly happened to Holloway – so many that her brother does not believe the latest confession.

But Holloway’s mother, Beth Holloway, told CBS News last week that has “peace” that her daughter’s case can finally be closed.

“After 18 years, Natalee’s case has been solved,” she told reporters outside the courthouse.

“Joran van der Sloot is the killer.”