Madeleine McCann Search: Police Prepare To Dig Two New Sites

Madeleine McCann Search: Police Prepare To Dig Two New Sites
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Madeleine McCann police and are ready to start work searching two fresh sites on the outskirts of Praia da Luz.

The new digs come after British police spent seven apparently fruitless days searching wasteland close to where Madeleine disappeared in May 2007.

Forensic experts and sniffer dogs combed the area using ground-penetrating radar and satellite imagery, which will be used again to scour the new sites.

The areas are half a mile from the Ocean Club complex where Madeleine's parents Kate and Gerry were staying when she disappeared in May 2007.

According to the Mirror, they were singled out after experts compared satellite images from 2007 and 2014 and noticed changes in the terrain.

One is located opposite a Brazilian-themed restaurant on the outskirts of the resort, where British detectives were spotted last week.

The overgrown 300 square-metre area sits behind a rusty locked metal gate and three-foot high wall on the old main road to the town of Lagos.

Madeleine's parents Kate, 46, and Gerry, 45, are being kept informed throughout the work and said last week they are bracing themselves for 'significant news'.

British detectives have identified eight male suspects they want to quiz in connection with Madeleine's disappearance.

They include three suspected burglars who live close to the wasteland in Praia da Luz searched by teams last week.

The men, who are convicted drug dealers, were traced from phone records which placed them in the resort at the time Madeleine vanished.

Met detectives believe Madeleine was snatched by a panicked gang who accidentally woke her in the family's apartment and took her with them, the Mirror reports.

A source said: "The British want to speak to the suspects in the very near future, possibly as soon as the searches are finished.

"But even though they have permission to question them, it's up to the Portuguese police as to when the interviews will happen."

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