McCanns demand to be cleared as police admit they 'need a miracle' to solve Madeleine mystery

Jose Magalhaes e Meneses refused to sanction further moves against them without better evidence to back up claims they were involved in Madeleine's disappearance days before her fourth birthday.

Privately, detectives admitted that it would take "a miracle" for them to build a stronger case against the couple.

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The McCann's spokesman Clarence Mitchell welcomed the admission.

He demanded that police lift Mr and Mrs McCann's status as official suspects, or aguidos, in the investigation.

"This would indicate the police absolutely, and quite rightly, have no case against Kate and Gerry.

"In these circumstances there is nothing for them to do but to clear Kate and Gerry and release their arguido status immediately."

Plans to ask British police to interview the McCanns and their friends, and to allow Portuguese detectives to be present at the interrogations, cannot happen without the approval of the public prosecutor.

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Police are still waiting for the results of final tests carried out by the Forensic Science Service in Birmingham, but have admitted that preliminary results were inconclusive.

A police source told the Portuguese newspaper 24 Horas: "We need a miracle.

"But we are still waiting for some results from analysis ordered from the Birmingham lab, which may provoke a revolution in the investigation."

The announcement came as Mr McCann prepared to return to his job as a cardiology consultant at Glenfield Hospital, Leicester.

A friend of the couple said they were pleased at the public prosecutor's decision.

"It's a disgrace that they have been living under a cloud of suspicion for so long and that only now are the police admitting they have no evidence against them."

The new head of the investigation, Paulo Rebelo, has begun a methodical review of every step of the six-month investigation, including re-enactments of the different theories in the case at the family's former holiday apartment in Praia da Luz.

He has also told his team of officers that he wants to re-interview the other official suspect in the case, British expat Robert Murat, and to speak to the workers who were in the tapas bar where the McCanns and their friends were dining on the night of May 3.

Mr Murat, 33, has said he will cooperate with police but has yet to be contacted about a new interview.

Mr Rebelo has also held a series of meetings with his predecessor, Goncalo Amaral, to ask him about allegations that the family's apartment was not properly sealed off, leading to evidence being contaminated.

Incredibly one police source claimed that the flat was not sealed off deliberately as "the author of the disappearance (the abductor) could return to the scene of the crime to recover some object they may have left behind".

Mr Amaral was sacked from the inquiry after claiming British police had been manipulated by the McCanns.

Yesterday he appeared before state prosecutors over accusations that he helped to cover up the alleged torture of a mother jailed for the murder of her missing daughter, eight.

Meanwhile a former child protection officer said the case had reached "a crucial stage" when officers would have to make a decision about the status of Mr and Mrs McCann, both 39, of Rothley, Leicestershire.

Mark Williams-Thomas, a former detective with Surrey Police, also warned the McCanns' private detectives could be chasing the wrong leads.

The Spanish detective agency Metodo 3 has said it believes Madeleine was stolen to order and is being kept alive, possibly in Morocco where there have been ten sightings.

POIGNANT MOMENT OF PRAYER

The McCanns will this weekend mark the six-month anniversary of the moment they believe their daughter was kidnapped.

They will say prayers for Madeleine between 9.30pm and 9.45pm on Saturday in their home town.

Identical prayers will be said at the same time in the Algarve resort where Madeleine disappeared from her bed, and in Liverpool, Mrs McCann's birthplace.

The couple have organised other services since Madeleine went missing. But this is the first time they have chosen to commemorate the exact time they say she vanished.

Mr McCann told police he last saw Madeleine in bed at 9.05pm on May 3. Another check was done by a friend who listened outside the door at

9.30pm. At 10pm Mrs McCann discovered that Madeleine was missing.

A friend of the couple said: "By choosing to mark the time we all believe Madeleine went, it reinforces our belief she was kidnapped and Kate and Gerry had nothing to do with it."