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PRAIA DA LUZ - Portuguese police said today they had no plans to further search the scrubland where a report said the body of missing Madeleine McCann could be buried.
Dutch newspaper De Telegraaf published an anonymous letter yesterday saying the four-year-old's body could be found "under branches or stones" 15 km from the Algarve resort where she disappeared from her bedroom on May 3.
Seven police searched the area the report mentioned yesterday.
"For now, we have no concrete plans to enter the terrain (again)," police chief inspector Olegario de Sousa said today. "Like all the leads we receive, we will check it out thoroughly."
A spokesman for the local GNR police, which handles day-to-day policing, said they had received no request from the investigative police, who are in charge of the investigation, for help or to bring sniffer dogs to the area.
Clarence Mitchell, a spokesman for Madeleine's parents, said police were examining the letter to verify whether it was authentic.
The police have received countless leads in their investigation, including a possible sighting of Madeleine in Morocco, but have so far made no arrests and have identified only one suspect in their case.
De Sousa said a group of journalists had hired sniffer dogs to search the area on Thursday.
"These people are people who have no police training and who are walking around the bush looking for a scoop," he said.
Madeleine disappeared from her bed while her parents dined at a nearby restaurant in the small Praia da Luz Algarve resort.
Her parents, Kate and Gerry McCann, have launched a high-profile campaign to draw attention to her disappearance, including meeting with the pope in Rome and winning support from personalities such as David Beckham.
Gerry McCann said in the diary he publishes online (www.findmadeleine.com) he was upset by De Telegraaf publishing the letter, saying it should have been passed on to Portuguese police before publication.
"We were extremely disappointed in the publication of the anonymous letter in the Telegraaf claiming to know where Madeleine is buried," he wrote.
- REUTERS
