Police start search for Madeleine McCann in Portuguese reservoir
Lisbon, May 23 (EFE).- Police in Portugal launched a search for Madeleine McCann on Tuesday morning in a reservoir located some 50 kilometers from where the British girl went missing 16 years ago.
Portuguese police, backed by English and German officers, kicked off the fresh operation at the Arade dam after German authorities requested the search of the reservoir as part of their investigation into the three-year-old’s disappearance.
“As part of the investigation into the case of Madeleine McCann there are currently measures related to the criminal process taking place in Portugal,” a statement from the prosecutor’s office in the German state of Braunschweig said.
The prosecutor’s office added that the measures were being implemented by Portuguese law enforcement authorities with the support of officers of the German Federal Criminal Police Office.
“Further information on the background will not be released at this time,” the statement concluded.
The Arade damn and its surrounding area were also among the places the key suspect in the McCann case, Christian Brueckner, frequented.
McCann vanished on May 3, 2007 from her family’s holiday apartment where she was sleeping with her siblings while her parents were having dinner with a group of friends.
In 2020 German authorities identified Brueckner, who is currently serving jail sentences in Germany for unrelated crimes, as a key suspect in the suspected abduction.
The German federal prosecutor’s office believes McCann was allegedly killed by Brueckner, who is a convicted sex offender and child abuser.
Brueckner is currently in prison for raping a 72-year-old woman in the same area of the Algarve where Madeleine went missing.
Suspicions against him grew after he was extradited from Portugal to Germany in 2017 over allegations of sexual abuse of minors in Greece.
Investigations showed that he was near the holiday resort where the McCanns were staying the night the girl went missing.EFE
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