Post by LadyBlue on Aug 11, 2007 22:45:03 GMT -5
Police in Portugal have admitted for the first time that Madeleine McCann may be dead as her parents marked the 100th day since her disappearance yesterday.
Chief Inspector Olegario Sousa, a detective leading the investigation, said Kate and Gerry McCann were not suspects, scotching rumours that they were under suspicion. He told the BBC that suspected traces of blood found in the apartment where Madeleine was sleeping that are being analysed in Britain had given "intensity" to the possibility she was murdered.
There were signs of a backlash against the media storm in Praia da Luz as the 100th day came and went, with the message "Circus Go Home" written in dust on a car outside the village church where her parents made a fresh appeal for information. The day proved to be a turning point in Kate and Gerry McCann's relationiship with the Portuguese press. Last week one newspaper reported the possibility that Madeleine had been murdered and claimed that people in Praia da Luz were referring to them as "these bloody McCanns" and wanted them to go home. The Daily Mail also showed a hardening in its attitude with the headline: "So how often DID they check on their children?"
The McCanns made a plea for people to keep looking and praying for their daughter, missing since 3 May, at the church service in Praia da Luz and it was evident that a majority of people are still giving their strong backing to the family during their ordeal.
The church of Nossa Senhora da Luz was packed with people who came to show their support for the couple during the service, and Father Haynes Hubbard, the Anglican chaplain of the Algarve, said those who attended did not agree "for one second" that the McCanns should go home.
"Those of you who live in Luz and live around Luz, whose lives have been affected by this, will join me to say thank you to Kate and Gerry for staying here and allowing us to be part of this struggle with them," he said. "It would be easier for us if they left, but it wouldn't be right."
Outside the church, a crowd of film crews and photographers stood as the couple emerged to cheers and loud applause from holidaymakers and villagers.
Premiership football clubs around the UK marked the day by renewing appeals for the campaign to find Madeleine.
During Sunderland's home game against Spurs, both teams walked on to the pitch wearing white T-shirts bearing Madeleine's photograph and the words "Don't you forget about me". The words, from the Simple Minds song of the same name, are being used in a new section on YouTube that her parents launched on Friday to help find missing children.
A lone piper played a specially commissioned tune for Madeleine at the opening of the World Pipe Band competition in Glasgow yesterday and Mrs McCann's parents distributed posters, stickers and balloons in Liverpool.
Earlier, on Friday, Mr McCann told the BBC the family would not be "bullied" into leaving Portugal by some elements of the press and he spoke of the family's hopes that a new shift in the police investigation, centred on a British holidaymaker who arrived in Portugal on the same day as the McCanns, would yield a vital breakthrough in the case.
Yesterday Swiss police ended their search in Switzerland for five-year-old Ylenia Lenhard, who was abducted more than a week ago, and moved their investigations to Spain.
Police found the body of Urs Hans Von Aesch, who is the prime suspect in Ylenia's disappearance, in a forest in Switzerland. He is thought to have been on holiday in Praia da Luz at the same time Madeleine went missing.
news.independent.co.uk/europe/article2856859.ece
Chief Inspector Olegario Sousa, a detective leading the investigation, said Kate and Gerry McCann were not suspects, scotching rumours that they were under suspicion. He told the BBC that suspected traces of blood found in the apartment where Madeleine was sleeping that are being analysed in Britain had given "intensity" to the possibility she was murdered.
There were signs of a backlash against the media storm in Praia da Luz as the 100th day came and went, with the message "Circus Go Home" written in dust on a car outside the village church where her parents made a fresh appeal for information. The day proved to be a turning point in Kate and Gerry McCann's relationiship with the Portuguese press. Last week one newspaper reported the possibility that Madeleine had been murdered and claimed that people in Praia da Luz were referring to them as "these bloody McCanns" and wanted them to go home. The Daily Mail also showed a hardening in its attitude with the headline: "So how often DID they check on their children?"
The McCanns made a plea for people to keep looking and praying for their daughter, missing since 3 May, at the church service in Praia da Luz and it was evident that a majority of people are still giving their strong backing to the family during their ordeal.
The church of Nossa Senhora da Luz was packed with people who came to show their support for the couple during the service, and Father Haynes Hubbard, the Anglican chaplain of the Algarve, said those who attended did not agree "for one second" that the McCanns should go home.
"Those of you who live in Luz and live around Luz, whose lives have been affected by this, will join me to say thank you to Kate and Gerry for staying here and allowing us to be part of this struggle with them," he said. "It would be easier for us if they left, but it wouldn't be right."
Outside the church, a crowd of film crews and photographers stood as the couple emerged to cheers and loud applause from holidaymakers and villagers.
Premiership football clubs around the UK marked the day by renewing appeals for the campaign to find Madeleine.
During Sunderland's home game against Spurs, both teams walked on to the pitch wearing white T-shirts bearing Madeleine's photograph and the words "Don't you forget about me". The words, from the Simple Minds song of the same name, are being used in a new section on YouTube that her parents launched on Friday to help find missing children.
A lone piper played a specially commissioned tune for Madeleine at the opening of the World Pipe Band competition in Glasgow yesterday and Mrs McCann's parents distributed posters, stickers and balloons in Liverpool.
Earlier, on Friday, Mr McCann told the BBC the family would not be "bullied" into leaving Portugal by some elements of the press and he spoke of the family's hopes that a new shift in the police investigation, centred on a British holidaymaker who arrived in Portugal on the same day as the McCanns, would yield a vital breakthrough in the case.
Yesterday Swiss police ended their search in Switzerland for five-year-old Ylenia Lenhard, who was abducted more than a week ago, and moved their investigations to Spain.
Police found the body of Urs Hans Von Aesch, who is the prime suspect in Ylenia's disappearance, in a forest in Switzerland. He is thought to have been on holiday in Praia da Luz at the same time Madeleine went missing.
news.independent.co.uk/europe/article2856859.ece