The latest search for Madeleine McCann has ended in Portugal as tents were dismantled and heavy machinery removed from the site.
Officers have spent three days combing a reservoir and surrounding scrub after receiving “certain tips”.
It is not yet known if anything relevant has been found, but several bags were removed from the site.
A police boat entered the water this Tuesday at the Arade dam, in the municipality of Silves.
Image:
A police search team works on the edge of the Arade dam. Image: AP
staff he started digging in an area of land on a peninsula in Barragem do Arade on Wednesday afternoon.
A source close to the investigation told the Reuters news agency that there was “nothing to report” after the search, which involved cutting down vast undergrowth and using rakes and pickaxes as well as sniffer dogs.
German prosecutor Christian Wolters added: “Of course there is a certain expectation, but it is not.
high”.
He told Reuters it was important to show authorities were investigating the case.
The reservoir is about 31 miles from where it is located british girl went missing during a family holiday in Praia da Luz in the Algarve on 3 May 2007. Madeleine was only three years old at the time.
Image:
Staff at the Barragem do Arade reservoir
“Of course, we’re still looking for the body,” Wolters said. “We’re not just looking for that, of course. There are others
things too
Read more:
Tourists in the city synonymous with the case are finally waiting for answers
How events unfolded since the boy disappeared
“Any discovery of clothing could help the investigation,” he said.
Last year, German prosecutors named Christian B as the official suspect in Madeleine’s disappearance.
It is claimed that the convicted child abuser and drug dealer used to visit the reservoir, allegedly referring to it as “his paradise”.
Christian B is currently in prison for raping a 72-year-old woman in the same area of the Algarve region from which Madeleine disappeared, but has not been charged with any crime related to the disappearance.
Image:
Image: AP
The new search was sorted as a Home Office awarded an extra £110,000 in funding this financial year for the Metropolitan Police to help find Madeleine, down from just over £300,000 last year.
The total funding given to Operation Grange, the name given to the Met’s investigation into Madeleine, has been just under £13.1m since 2011.
