MADDY WATCH - Anorak’s at-a-glance guide to press coverage of Madeleine McCann

DAILY EXPRESS front page: “Madeleine parents in secret summit with the Tapas 9 friends”

Doesn’t the McCanns plus the Tapas Nine makes the Tapas 11, or the Elevenses 11?

Page 5: “’Suspicions’ over the Tapas Nine summit’” – The meeting is called “cloak and dagger”, says the Express. Friends of the McCanns call the reunion “highly emotional” and “deeply sad”

A sources says: “They wanted to talk about possibly being interviewed by the police again and what that may entail”

And they can. It is not breaking any law for the group to meet

“McCanns ‘guilty of neglect’” – Paulo Pereira Cristovao, who used to work for the Policia Judiciaria and now heads the organisation to find missing children in Portugal, says: “When [the McCanns] told the police that they went to dinner and left the children at home they confessed to the crime of abandonment. They should have been charged for that crime on the first day”

But they were not. And others who have tried to pursue them have failed

THE SUN page 17: “TAPAS 9 IN SECRET MEETING”

This is the fist time the diners have met since the night Madeleine disappeared, although they have spoken to each other via phone and email

Kate and Gerry McCann are “doctors”

Says a source: “They and their friends should not be meeting to discuss the case”. A friend of the couple called the meting as an “expression of support”

DAILY MAIL page 30: “Tapas Nine ‘talks tactics’ - Portuguese police are furious over friends’ summit”

A source close to the Portuguese investigation says: “The McCanns left Portugal the moment they were made suspects and refused to answer many key questions. Now they and their friends are about to be re-interviewed and it is revealed they have met up in secret in a hotel”

Says the McCanns’ spokesman Clarence Mitchell: “It was the first time the group had sat down together since Madeleine’s disappearance but they have been in constant email and phone contact”

DAILY MIRROR page 12: “TAPAS 9 HOLD SECRET MEETING TO TALK TACTICS”

Watched by police and paparazzi, how did this secret meeting come to be arranged, and how did it pass unnoticed?

The McCanns, Dr David Payne (“heart specialist”), Fiona (his “doctor wife”), Dr Russell O’Brien (”hospital consultant”), Jane Tanner, Dr Matthew Oldfield (“endocrinologist”), Rachel (doctor’s wife) and Dr Payne’s mother Dianne Webster all met in one Leicestershire hotel and no-one saw?

“CHIEF SLAM McCANNS” – Paul Pereira Cristovao says…

DAILY STAR page 15: “COPS PROBE TAPAS SEVEN SECRET CHAT”

And then there were 7…

“Under English law such a meeting between the McCanns, who are both suspects, and their key witness pals would be banned during a criminal investigation”

THE TIMES page 9: “Kate and Gerry McCann deny the Tapas Nine met ‘to get story straight’”

Says Clarence Mitchell: “This was in no way to get their stories straight. This is the age of e-mail and phone. They could have done that a long time ago”

Although emails and phone calls can be monitored

Tapas 9 member Rachael Oldfield is “36” and a “recruitment consultant”

Such are the facts

DAILY TELEGRAPH: “Madeleine McCann: Tapas 9’s secret meeting”

Says a source: “It was a show of solidarity under police claims that one or two had wanted to change their stories. That is just not the case and the meeting showed that. It was a meeting to express support by the friends and just to see each other again. They hadn’t seen each other properly”

Pereira Cristovao heads the Portuguese Association for Missing Children (APCD), which leads the hunt for missing children in Portugal.

Says he: “I was asked what I thought about inviting the McCanns to the APCD. I said no, because they’re suspects. She is (the ninth child on the PJ’s missing people page) but the case involves a criminal investigation which is still on the boil, with the parents as suspects. We have eight children whose disappearances are unexplained”

It’s a “snub”, says the Telegraph

Says Clarence Mitchell: “Madeleine is still a missing child and she went missing in Portugal so we would hope that she would be treated as such by this organisation but ultimately that is a matter for them”

THE GUARDIAN and THE INDEPENDENT: No Madeleine news today

The Madeleine McCann Story

Posted: 11th, December 2007 | In: Madeleine McCann. Follow the Comments on our RSS feed: RSS 2.0