Brit Madeleine McCann cops hold crunch meeting with German & Portuguese police in Lisbon in bid to find missing toddler
SCOTLAND Yard detectives have reportedly held a secret meeting with German and Portuguese police in Lisbon in a bid to find Madeleine McCann.
The aim of the conference was to fine-tune suspect Christian B's profile to try to work out where Madeleine’s body may have been buried after she was kidnapped, with German cops believing she is dead.
The meeting is said to have taken place “recently” at the Lisbon HQ of the Policia Judiciaria (PJ), the force heading the Portuguese probe into the three-year-old's disappearance, reports daily newspaper Correio da Manha.
The PJ handed over information relating to searches that had been carried out at locations in the Algarve but turned up nothing in the search for Madeleine.
The report added: “Wells and ditches have been looked at with a fine tooth comb, but no signs of the remains of the missing girl have been found.“
Portuguese, British and German authorities haven’t given up and are continuing to try to gather information about German paedophile Christian B.
German police have long insisted he is their only suspect and they believe he is the one who took and killed Madeleine on May 3, 2007.
“They regard it as essential to work out his routine in 2007, when Madeleine disappeared and Christian B was living near the Ocean Club where she vanished from," the newspaper reports.
It comes as German police want to return to Praia da Luz as part of a “final roll of the dice” in their investigation into the 43-year-old convicted paedophile .
The claim followed German prosecutor Hans Christian Wolters’ admission that without new clues, Christian B will never be quizzed over missing Madeleine.
Mr Wolters told podcast They’ve Taken Her he was “hopeful” evidence would be found for police to charge and quiz the paedophile.
But he added: “At the moment our evidence is not so strong we are sure he will be sentenced by the court.
“Maybe we need more witnesses or photos or video, one witness who can tell us the things we don’t know."
Three wells near Praia da Luz are known to have been searched in July but police and firefighters failed to find any trace of Madeleine.
German authorities are treating the case as a murder inquiry and say they have concrete evidence the missing youngster is dead - but have yet to reveal what this evidence they have.
The abandoned wells are a 15-minute drive from Christian B's rented cottage on the outskirts of Praia de Luz, on a narrow road leading down to a beach where the paedophile used to park his VW camper van.
Christian B is also being probed in Germany over a 2004 Algarve rape and a sex attack on a beach near Praia da Luz a month before Madeleine vanished.
In Portugal, prosecutors have reopened their investigation into a sex crime in a playground he was arrested over in 2017.
He was held on suspicion of exposing himself to young children at a playground in Sao Bartolomeu de Messines a 40-minute drive from Praia de Luz.
Police discovered after his detention that he was wanted by Germany on an international arrest warrant for child sex abuse and possession of child pornography.
He was extradited to his homeland and was never prosecuted in Portugal following his Algarve arrest.
The criminal probe was mothballed despite protests from the youngsters’ angry parents but reopened last month.
Christian B's lawyer Friedrich Fulscher has insisted his client, currently serving a 21-month drug sentence in prison in the German city of Kiel, has nothing to do with Madeleine’s disappearance.
Last month, the sex offender was told he would remain in jail after losing a legal challenge against an earlier extradition from Italy to Germany.
He had insisted the “flawed” extradition should lead to him being freed early, but the ruling means he will now stay in jail until 2024 at least.
There has not yet been any official comment from police about the recent Lisbon meeting between the three forces.
It comes after The Sun Online revealed German police are searching for associates of Christian B he knew around the time Madeleine vanished, including two Russians.
It is understood the Russians are two brothers with links to Spain, and it is reported Christian B's ex-girlfriend, a babysitter, often talked about working for Russians.
Portuguese TV channel RTP reported she worked for Russian clients who were involved in the sale of yachts.
Mr Wolters declined to confirm whether the men are being treated as suspects or witnesses as its thought they could be linked to the struggling case.
Detectives sensationally named Christian B as the prime suspect in June just after the 13th anniversary of Madeleine's disappearance.
He is yet to be charged with any crime related to the missing Brit toddler, who vanished while on holiday with her parents, Kate and Gerry McCann, and her siblings in Praia Da Luz.
Sources have told The Sun Online that cops need a breakthrough in the next ten weeks or the case against Christian B could “evaporate”.
However, cops fear many witnesses may never come forward as they are "terrified" of Christian B.
Timeline of Madeleine's disappearance
28 April 2007 The McCanns go on holiday at the Ocean Club complex in Praia da Luz.
3 May 2007 Madeleine disappears between 9.30pm and 10pm while her parents are out for dinner at a nearby tapas restaurant.
4 May 2007 Portuguese police investigation begins, the McCanns make an impassioned appeal for information - with Kate holding Madeleine's favourite toy, Cuddle Cat.
7 September 2007 During further questioning of Mr and Mrs McCann, detectives make them both suspects in their daughter's disappearance.
29 November 2007 Local pizza shop owner George Brook told British media he saw a "vicious looking" man and woman dragging a little blonde girl towards the marina at 6am. He said Portugese police ignored his report.
6 May 2009 After the McCann's appear on the Oprah Winfrey show, several witnesses come forward to say they had seen an "ugly" man with dark hair watching the McCann's apartment in the days leading up to Madeleine's disappearance.
6 August 2009 Police say they are looking for a "Victoria Beckham" lookalike in connection with Madeleine's disappearance.
13 May 2011 Then prime minister David Cameron asks London's Metropolitan Police to help investigate the case.
9 March 2012 Portuguese police in Porto launch a review of the original investigation.
26 April 2012 Scotland Yard says Madeleine McCann may still be alive and release an artist's impression of what she may look like as a nine-year-old.
15 June 2013 The Home Office agrees to fund a full-scale investigation by the Metropolitan Police.
14 October 2013 Police release an e-fit of a man seen by witnesses carrying a small blonde child near the McCann's resort. The man was white with brown hair.
24 October 2013 Detectives in Portugal reopen the investigation into Madeleine McCann's disappearance after an internal review uncovers new lines of inquiry and witnesses who were never questioned during the original Portuguese investigation.
19 March 2014 British Police reveal they are looking for a man with tanned skin and unkempt long brown hair after a man of that description sexually abused five young girls in their beds between 2004 and 2010.
28 October 2015 The number of police officers devoted to the investigation into Madeleine's disappearance is reduced from 29 to four.
3 April 2016 Theresa May, then home secretary, grants Scotland Yard £95,000 in extra funding to continue the search for Madeleine.
12 March 2017 The Home Office gives police £85,000 to extend the search for Madeleine - known as Operation Grange - for a further six months. It takes the total spent on the investigation to beyond £11m.
2 May 2017 A secret Home Office report reveals Gerry and Kate McCann claimed they were treated badly by Portuguese police from the start of the investigation into Madeleine's disappearance - and they fell out with UK authorities too and later did not share with police information gathered by their own private investigators.
13 November 2018 Police investigating the disappearance of Madeleine have received a further £150,000 in government funding.
4 May 2019 German child killer, Martin Ney,who matches an e-fit of man seen shortly after she vanished is named as a suspect in the case.
2 June 2019 Scotland Yard granted a further £300,000 for the investigation
3 June 2020 Christian B is identified a new suspect in the case and German police say they are treating her disappearance as a murder investigation
Wolters has previously said on Portuguese television that Christian B is their "only" suspect in the Madeleine case.
He also said that "everything" the investigators have points to the tot being dead, despite her parents refusing to believe it until her body has been found.
However, the prosecutor admitted there is no "smoking gun" as the German has still not yet been charged despite being named as a suspect three months ago.
German authorities are treating Madeleine's disappearance as a murder probe, while Scotland Yard continue to treat it as a missing persons case.
With the case on the rocks however, Christian B’s lawyer Fulscher called on prosecutors to show their hand to be "fair" to the suspect and Madeleine's parents Kate and Gerry.
''It is no secret that the Portuguese have a different theory of what happened to the German BKA (federal police),” he said.
"The German prosecution could put an end to this theory when they finally put their cards on the table."
Madeleine is believed to have been snatched from the holiday apartment where she was sleeping alongside her twin siblings Sean and Amelie.
Described as a "twisted loner", Christian B is understood to have been a kind of drifter around the resort at the time - who made a living selling drugs and stealing from holiday apartments.
He was first linked to the Madeleine case after he allegedly made a drunken boast he snatched her while in a bar on the tenth anniversary of the crime.
Madeleine would have turned 17 this year, and the family have described the identification of Christian B as "potentially very significant".
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Kate and Gerry have been left exasperated by prosecutors saying their daughter is a murder victim and even though they don't have evidence to charge him.
Experts have said Christian B matches the profile of a Jimmy Savile-style “paraphiliac”, who targets victims of all ages.
And he is known to have owned a mobile home he boasted could carry "drugs and children".
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Mobile phone data suggests prolific sex offender Christian B was in the Portuguese resort when Madeleine vanished - and made a mysterious call just one hour before she was taken.
The Met Police declined to comment on the meeting with German and Portuguese detectives when contacted by The Sun Online.