Résumé : A search for pair produced charged Higgs bosons has been performed in the high energy data collected by DELPHI at LEP with √s = 161, 172 and 183 GeV. The analysis uses the τντν, cs̄τν and cs̄c̄s final states and a combination of event shape variables, di-jet masses and jet flavour tagging for the separation of a possible signal from the dominant W+W- and QCD backgrounds. The number of selected events has been found to be compatible with the expected background. The lower excluded value of the H± mass obtained by varying the H±→ hadrons decay branching ratio has been found to be 56.3 GeV/c2. © 1999 Published by Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.