Kate and Gerry McCann plan to stay in the Algarve at least until the end of the summer to hunt for their abducted daughter, a family spokesman said today.
The couple cannot bear to leave the last place four-year-old Madeleine was seen. It is now 37 days since their little girl was taken from her bed in the family's holiday apartment in Praia da Luz.
Despite an unprecedented publicity drive and trips across Europe to highlight her disappearance, there is still no sign of her. A spokesman for the family said it was impossible for the McCanns to contemplate going back to the family home in Rothley, Leicestershire.
"They don't put a specific timescale on it but they are prepared to live here until the end of the summer at the very earliest," he said. "As far as they are concerned this is where Madeleine still is. Even if she is somewhere else physically, this is the place where mentally they make a connection. They can't go from here."
Mr and Mrs McCann are expected to move out of their Mark Warner apartment next week into more permanent housing. They are going to Morocco tomorrow on the last of their trips to raise awareness of her abduction. They are keen to go because of its proximity to Portugal. Several ferries a day leave from Tarifa in Spain for the 35-minute crossing to Tangiers.
Morocco has surfaced repeatedly in the hunt for Madeleine, with a reported sighting of a little girl seen with a man. Mari Olli, a Norwegian woman who lives in Fuengirola on Spain's Costa del Sol said she was "very sure" she had seen Madeleine at a petrol station in Marrakech on May 9th.
Yesterday, the search was linked to South America for the first time. It is understood a mysterious call claiming to know Madeleine's whereabouts came from a mobile phone registered in Argentina. The "credible" call was considered so potentially significant that the McCanns halted their search of Europe to help police investigate. They delayed their flight from
The call from the pay-as-you-go phone came from a man who wanted to speak directly to the McCanns but all attempts to re-establish contact failed, according to Spanish police sources. Spanish newspaper El Mundo reported that a man matching the description released by Portuguese police two weeks ago was seen in a bar in Seville a week before Madeleine's abduction. It claimed the man was working on the instruction of others and told fellow drinkers he was going to the Algarve.
Berlin to Amsterdam by three hours and plans were drawn up to divert to the UK.