PAThe Metropolitan Police has been granted more funds to continue its 11-year-long search for Madeleine McCann, as detectives explore more lines of inquiry.
Operation Grange – the Met investigation into Madeleine McCann’s disappearance – has reportedly been allocated up to £150,000 by The Home Office, they announced yesterday March 26).
The operation will continue to investigated an ‘important final line of inquiry’.
GettyA representative of the Home Office told MailOnline:
The Government remains committed to the investigation into the disappearance of Madeleine McCann.
We have briefed the Metropolitan Police Service that its application for Special Grant funding for Operation Grange will be granted.
The inquiry has not reached a conclusion and we’re continuing with focus and determination. There are no immediate plans to reduce officer numbers further at this time.
GettyA Scotland Yard spokesperson said:
We cannot give a running commentary on the investigation while it is ongoing.
Detectives were unable to discuss details of the ‘important final line of inquiry’ they are pursuing.
PAMore than £11 million has been spent so far on the probe to find the missing girl, who vanished from the family’s holiday apartment in Praia da Luz in Portugal in May 2007, aged three.
There have been 9,000 reported sightings of Madeleine since she vanished, just nine days before her fourth birthday in 2007. She would now be nearly 15.
Here’s a timeline of the events of that fateful evening:
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Some 600 ‘persons of interest’ have been examined and thousands of so-called sightings of Madeleine have been assessed, in Brazil, India, Morocco and Paraguay, on a German plane and in a New Zealand supermarket.
Since her disappearance, Madeleine’s parents Kate and Gerry McCann have dedicated themselves to finding their daughter.
The couple, from Rothley, Leicestershire, are said to be ‘incredibly grateful’ to the Home Office for approving Scotland Yard’s latest funding request.
GettyFamily spokesman Clarence Mitchell said:
They are very encouraged that the Met Police still believe there is work left to be done and they are incredibly grateful to the Home Office for providing an extra budget for the investigation.
It gives them hope that one day they may finally find out what happened to their daughter.
PAThe family said they would ‘never give up’ on the Find Madeleine Facebook page last Christmas:
We just wanted to pass on our love and thanks to everyone who has continued to support us throughout another year.
Friendship, solidarity and warm wishes go a long way in giving us the strength to get through and make the very best of it.
GettyGovernment funding for the investigation – one of the most high profile and expensive in history – is usually agreed every six months, and the £154,000 which was granted in October last year is due to run out in just five days.
Operation Grange was launched under David Cameron after the Portuguese investigation of Madeleine’s disappearance was criticised by the British authorities as being not fit for purpose.
Facebook/Official.Find.Madeleine.CampaignOther investigators have come forward in the previous months to weigh in on the McCann’s personal trauma.
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A former emo kid who talks too much about 8Chan meme culture, the Kardashian Klan, and how her smartphone is probably killing her. Francesca is a Cardiff University Journalism Masters grad who has done words for BBC, ELLE, The Debrief, DAZED, an art magazine you’ve never heard of and a feminist zine which never went to print.