Police are investigating the death of a woman whose nude body was found on the beach in Waikiki early yesterday morning.

Police classified the incident as a suspicious unattended death.

A jogger came across the woman's body on the beach fronting The Royal Hawaiian hotel at 6:01 a.m., police said.

The body was found just before sunrise in the shore break along a stretch of beach in front of some of Waikiki's priciest real estate and top-end hotel rooms.

Police strung yellow crime scene tape between a row of beach recliner chairs, forcing early-morning beachcombers to make a detour around the body, an unusual sight in O'ahu's prime tourism destination.

Investigators later moved the woman's body up the beach, close to a concrete wall that separates The Royal Hawaiian hotel from the public beach area. The wall also served as a barrier to keep the body out of public view.

The body was quickly covered with a white sheet, and a white canopy was set up to shield the body and police investigators from the searing sun.

Police Lt. William Kato, head of the homicide unit, said investigators sifted through the missing-persons files, but did not find a description that matched that of the dead woman.

The city Department of the Medical Examiner conducted an autopsy on the woman yesterday afternoon; results were not immediately available.

Bryan Cheplic of the city Emergency Services Department said paramedics pronounced the woman dead at 6:27 a.m.

Police said the woman appeared to be in her 20s. She was described as between 5 feet 6 and 5 feet 7, about 140 pounds, with black hair.

The body had two tattoos — a capital letter "M" on the left heel and a red heart with wings on the right wrist.

Police would not say whether there were obvious injuries to the woman. They said there were no signs of the woman's clothing.

They ask anyone with information to call the Criminal Investigation Division at 529-3115.