A Portuguese magistrate is today expected to begin interviewing friends of the family of the British child Madeleine McCann, who went missing on the Algarve 11 days ago, writes Giles Tremlettin Praia da Luz.
The four-year-old girl vanished from her family's holiday apartment in the resort of Praia da Luz on the Algarve on May 3rd, and is believed to have been abducted.
Those due to be called before the magistrate in the nearby town of Lagos are not suspects in the case but will have to confirm earlier evidence given to police and answer any additional questions that the investigating magistrate may have.
The inquiries in Portugal now appear to be shifting into a slower and longer-term investigation.
While there is little information emerging, there has been concentrated police activity. Sources said yesterday that officers had been making targeted searches of white vans.
Madeleine's mother, Kate McCann, returned to church yesterday morning in Praia da Luz to pray once more for the return of her daughter.
Prayers for Madeleine, whose birthday was on Saturday, were echoed across Portugal and especially at the country's holiest shrine in Fatima, where hundreds of thousands of people gathered to mark the 90th anniversary of the moment when three young children had a vision of the Virgin Mary.
An English priest yesterday became the latest in a team of people who have flown out from Britain to support the McCann family. Father Paul Seddon, the priest who married the McCanns and baptised Madeleine, joined Mrs McCann at mass.
Portugal's president, Anibal Cavaco Silva, defended the police investigation. "It would be difficult for them to do more than they have done so far," he said.
But the family of a Portuguese child who disappeared nine years ago pointed out that the country's record for searching for the missing is not good. For Filomena Texeira, whose 11-year-old son Rui Pedro is still missing, the contrast between the resources being poured into looking for Madeleine and the lack of effort in the hunt for her own child could not be more stark. She recalled that just half-a-dozen officers were allocated to look for her son.
Guardian service