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Last night, in an appeal for help, Scotland Yard announced a child sex offender was their new prime suspect in the disappearance of Madeleine McCann – an announcement that Kate and Gerry McCann believe is “potentially very significant” in solving the 13-year-long case. The 43-year-old German man, who has not been named, is currently serving a long prison sentence in Germany for an “unrelated matter,” but is believed to have been in Praia da Luz, on the Algarve coast, around the time Maddie vanished on May 3, 2007. The suspect has been described as white, with short blonde hair, around six-feet-tall with a slim build and is believed to have received a half-an-hour phone call on his Portuguese mobile around an hour before Maddie is thought to have vanished.

Police are appealing for information about a van and the suspects other vehicle, a Jaguar, which was transferred to someone else’s name the day after Maddie vanished, as well as hoping the unknown caller will step forward to shed light on the events of that day.

Kate and Gerry McCann have always supported the theory that Maddie was snatched by a criminal working in the local area and it was claimed at the time that several other apartments in the holiday complex had been robbed in the weeks leading up to her disappearance.

Kate speculated during her book ‘Madeleine: Our Daughter’s Disappearance and the Continuing Search for Her’ that the family’s actions over the week may have aided someone who was monitoring them as potential targets.

She wrote in 2011: “Gerry and I have always quite liked having a routine, though wouldn’t say we were obsessed by it.

“Our children, like most children, seemed to like it and this holiday was no exception.

“It’s hard to accept that living our lives in such an ordinary way may have been our downfall.

“Was someone watching us that week? Watching Madeleine? Taking notes of our days?”

Kate also detailed during the same book why their holiday apartment may have also been a “prime target”.

Recalling how the family went away with married couple David and Fiona Payne and Mrs Payne’s mother Diana Webster, she wrote: “Our apartments were in a five-storey block accessed from the front by a road – Rua Dr Agostinho da Silva.

“Ours, 5A, was on the corner of the block.

“Though I envied David and Fiona with their sea view, being on the ground floor meant we didn’t have to worry about the children’s safety on a balcony.”

However, Kate soon learned that these benefits may have also played into a criminal’s hands.

She added: “Later, we were told by the British police that the ground-floor location, access to roads front and side, secluded entrance and partial tree cover made our apartment a prime target for burglars and criminals.

“Never once did this occur to us when we arrived.”

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Maddie disappeared from Apartment 5A of the Ocean Club complex, while her parents ate dinner with friends at a tapas restaurant just metres away.

Over the last 13 years, investigators have worked tirelessly to find out what happened and are hoping this new appeal for help could lead to further breakthroughs.

DCI Mark Cranwell, who is leading the Met inquiry, said yesterday: “Someone out there knows a lot more than they’re letting on.”

He added that the prisoner, then aged 30, frequented the Algarve between 1995 and 2007, staying for “days upon end” in his camper van and living a “transient lifestyle”.

The suspect has been linked to an early Eighties VW T3 Westfalia camper van – with a white upper body and yellow skirting, registered in Portugal – which was pictured in the Algarve in 2007.

Scotland Yard said he was driving the vehicle in the Praia da Luz area in the days before Maddie’s disappearance and is believed to have been living in it for days or weeks before and after May 3.

The suspect has also been linked to a 1993 Jaguar XJR6 with a German number plate seen in Praia da Luz and surrounding areas in 2006 and 2007.

Police said the German authorities had taken the lead on this aspect of the case because the suspect was in custody in their country and an appeal on German television was broadcast last night at 7:15pm.

Police released details of the suspect’s phone number and the number he dialled saying any information could be “critical” to the inquiry and have asked the person who called the suspect to come forward.

DCI Cranwell added: “They’re a key witness and we urge them to get in touch.

“Some people will know the man we’re describing today, you may be aware of some of the things he’s done.

“He may have confided in you about the disappearance of Madeleine.

“More than 13 years have passed and your loyalties may have changed.

“Now is the time to come forward.”

The suspect is one of 600 people that detectives on the inquiry, known as Operation Grange, originally looked at.

After an appeal in 2017, “significant” fresh information about him was provided.

Since then, Met detectives have carried out “extensive inquiries” in Portugal and Germany in order to gather more details about him.

Scotland Yard said they were trying to “prove or disprove” his involvement in the case and retained an “open mind”.

‘Madeleine: Our daughter’s disappearance and the continuing search for her’ was published by Transworld Publishers Ltd and is available here.

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