LONDON - Missing British girl Madeleine McCann's parents say they are more hopeful of finding her than at any time since she vanished in Portugal five years ago.
Kate and Gerry McCann said they hoped Portuguese authorities would reopen the investigation to their daughter's disappearance after "new information" had come to light.
"We're probably more hopeful now than at any point in the last five years," Madeleine's father Gerry told reporters in London a day before the fifth anniversary of Madeleine's disappearance from the Praia de Luz resort. He stressed new information had emerged since British police began an investigative review last year and "the chances of finding Madeleine have increased".
"If people want the case solved and want to bring the perpetrators to justice the best chance is to formally reopen the case," Gerry McCann said.
Scotland Yard said last week a review had unearthed 195 "investigative opportunities" in the evidence surrounding Madeleine's disappearance in 2007. She went missing from a holiday apartment during a family holiday as her parents and friends ate in a nearby restaurant. She was just short of her fourth birthday when she vanished.
But after Scotland Yard's statement, Portuguese police said they had no evidence that would cause the judiciary to declare a reopening of the investigation, although detectives would continue to "re-examine elements of the inquiry".