German authorities break silence on ‘constructive’ search for Madeleine McCann

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The latest search for Madeleine McCann has been described as “very productive” by Braunschweig head prosecutor Hans Christian Wolters.

The search, conducted by German and Portuguese authorities, concluded as planned, Mr Wolters said.

It comes after reports in The Sun that samples were taken during last week’s search, amid claims of bones and clothing fibres being discovered.

According to the report, the bones were initially thought to be animal remains but have been retained for forensic examination.

Madeleine disappeared in 2007, aged three, from the resort of Praia da Luz in Portugal, where she was on holiday with her family.

The latest search for evidence comes 18 years after her disappearance.

Madeleine McCann disappeared in 2007 (PA)
She was left sleeping by her parents, Kate and Gerry McCann, and vanished as they went for dinner in a nearby restaurant.

Search teams concluded their operation in neighbouring Atalaia, near the city of Lagos, after three days of scouring scrubland and abandoned structures.

German prosecutors requested the search as part of their continued attempts to source evidence to implicate prime suspect Christian Brueckner.

He is in prison for raping a 72-year-old woman in Praia da Luz in 2005 and is due to be released from jail in September if no further charges are brought.

According to reports, Brueckner sent a letter to police saying “decisive questions can never be answered”.

Another letter shows the suspect telling Mr Wolters that “the investigation will be dropped”, The Sun reported.

In October 2024, Brueckner was cleared by a German court of unrelated sexual offences, alleged to have taken place in Portugal between 2000 and 2017.

A van of German Investigation Police leaves the search operations (AFP/Getty)

How the search unfolded

Small teams of a dozen-or-so officers spent three days last week in the beating sun as they scoured derelict farmhouses and outbuildings in the stretch of scrubland just over a mile from where Madeleine was last seen.

The 120-acre area, off a dramatic clifftop path along the coast between Atalaia and Lagos, is said to have once been populated by a farming community, but it has long been abandoned because it is so arid.

Officers from Portugal’s most senior force, the Policia Judiciaria, shifted rocks and rubble in the unrelenting heat.

They used shovels and chainsaws as they battled with rock-hard ground and overgrown vegetation.

Fire crews helped them to pump out a disused well at one derelict farm building, which was littered with graffiti.

When one local policeman was asked by a journalist what they expected to find, he rolled his eyes and shrugged, before saying: “You tell me.”