Surprise new search for Madeleine McCann

Portuguese police have announced they will start a new search for the missing British girl in conjunction with German authorities.

Portuguese police will carry out a new search this week in the municipality of Lagos at the request of German authorities investigating the 2007 disappearance of three-year-old Madeleine McCann, a spokesman told AFP on Monday.

The toddler was never found after going missing from the resort in Praia da Luz where she was with her family, one of the most high-profile missing person cases in history.

Police said it will carry out “a wide range of actions” between Tuesday and Friday near the southern Portugal seaside resort where the girl disappeared on May 3, 2007.

The move is part of a warrant issued by the Brunswick Public Prosecutor’s Office, in northern Germany, which is conducting a preliminary investigation into Christian Bruckner, suspected by German authorities of killing McCann, the Portuguese police spokesman said, confirming information from British and Portuguese media.

An undated handout photograph released by the Metropolitan Police in London shows Madeleine McCann who disappeared in Praia da Luz, Portugal on May 3, 2007. (Photo by Handout / METROPOLITAN POLICE / AFP).

“All the evidence seized by police will, with prior authorisation from the national public prosecutor’s office, be handed over to agents of the German federal criminal police,” the spokesman added.

The last search occurred in May 2023, near a lake.

Christian Bruckner, the man suspected by German authorities of murdering missing British girl Madeleine McCann. (Photo by Julian Stratenschulte / POOL / AFP)

“As part of the investigation into the Madeleine McCann case, criminal proceedings are currently underway in Portugal,” a spokesman for the Brunswick public prosecutor’s office, Christian Wolters, told AFP.

“We are aware of the searches conducted by the BKA (the German federal police) in Portugal as part of their investigation into Madeleine McCann’s disappearance. The (British) police services are not on-site but we will assist our international colleagues wherever needed,” a British police spokesman told AFP.

Bruckner, currently serving a prison sentence for rape, was acquitted in October 2024 in Germany in a trial for two sexual assaults and three rapes committed between 2000 and 2017 in Portugal.

Originally published as Surprise new search for Madeleine McCann