Well-wisher toys for Madeleine to go to charity

Sep 27 2007

Friends and family of Gerry and Kate McCann are to send more than 2,000 toys and gifts left by well-wishers in the days after Madeleine’s disappearance to needy children in eastern Europe.

Cuddly toys and dolls were left at the war memorial in the family’s home village of Rothley, Leicestershire, in May as a symbol of hope and support for the search for the four-year-old after she went missing in Praia da Luz, Portugal.

The gifts were removed over the summer along with thousands of yellow and green ribbons tied to railings at the memorial which had became a focal point for prayers for Madeleine.

The toys were gathered up and carefully washed by parents from the village’s two primary schools and are now set to be shipped to children in Belarus.

Janet Kennedy, Kate’s aunt, will be among a handful of people meeting today to package up the toys into shoeboxes. Each will be sent with a small picture of Madeleine.

Friends of the couple also urged holidaymakers to continue the search for Madeleine.

Reporters yesterday descended on the remote hillside village of Zinat in the north of the Morocco after a striking photograph of a blonde girl was flashed around the world as a possible sighting of the four-year-old.

But it quickly emerged that the girl in the photograph was five-year-old Bushra Binhisa, the daughter of an olive farmer.

Evening Standard journalist Rashid Razaq, who flew to Morocco from London, said: “She has got a resemblance to Madeleine but when you see her properly, it is obvious it isn’t her.”

Clarence Mitchell, the McCanns’ spokesman, said: “Clearly, the search for Madeleine will continue and I would appeal for everyone to refocus their efforts to achieve her safe return.”

It emerged last night that nearly £300,000 has been spent so far on the search for Madeleine by the fund set up to that end.

Fund directors meeting in Leicestershire said the cash had gone on the campaign launch, advertising, producing yellow and green wristbands and employing a campaign manager.

A new £80,000 advertising campaign is being launched shortly in Portugal, Spain and Morocco.

Individuals and organisations have so far given £1,036,104 to Madeleine’s Fund, a non-charitable not-for-profit company.