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The mayor of the Portuguese town from which British girl Madeleine McCann disappeared has called the unresolved case a "stain" on his community and accused her parents of abandonment.
Manuel Domingues Borba, mayor of the resort town of Praia da Luz, said Kate and Gerry McCann were "guilty at least" of abandoning their daughter, Britain's Daily Mail reported.
The British couple - who are formal suspects in their daughter's disappearance - should never have been allowed to leave Portugal, the major, who is a former policeman, said.
At the very least, they were guilty of "extreme negligence" for leaving Madeleine and their other children alone in the family's resort apartment while the couple dined at a nearby restaurant.
Madeleine disappeared from the apartment while the couple said they enjoyed a meal out with friends.
The girl, who would now be four, disappeared on May 3.
Traders in the Portuguese resort town where Madeline vanished have taken down posters appealing for help to find the British toddler.
The "Find Madeline" appeals which adorned street corners and shop windows in Praia da Luz have come down and green and yellow ribbons which were tied to trees as symbols of hope have been removed.
Meri Hanlin, who runs a local health food shop, said the child's disappearance had "ruled everything" and "got a little too much" for villagers.
"It's not that the locals don't care about what happened but they just want to get the village back to how it was," she said.
Madeline's parents, Kate and Gerry McCann, launched a massive world-wide publicity campaign in a bid to find the girl after she went missing from their holiday apartment on May 3.
The couple were declared formal suspects by Portuguese police but both deny any involvement in their daughter's disappearance and they have returned to Britain with their two other children.
Even the local Roman Catholic priest has reportedly ordered all traces of the Madeline appeal to be removed from his Our Lady of the Light church, where the McCanns prayed for their daughter's safe return.
McCann family spokesman Clarence Mitchell said the couple still believed they had the support of many people in Praia da Luz.
©AAP 2007
