Police intelligence suggesting Madeleine McCann may have been snatched to order for a Belgian paedophile ring is being urgently investigated by private detectives for the little girl's parents.
Scotland Yard passed on a report from an informant who said a photograph of the child on holiday in Portugal was taken and passed to a "purchaser" in Belgium days before she vanished, official case files have revealed.
The information was containe
d in an email from the Metropolitan Police's CO14 clubs and vice intelligence unit included in a massive dossier of evidence made public this week.
Portuguese police pursued the lead with Interpol, which gathered further reports from Belgium, the UK, Finland and Germany.
But detective Paulo Rebelo, head of the Madeleine inquiry, ruled that all but the German intelligence showed "lack of credibility" and ordered that the Scotland Yard tip-off should be filed.
The Metropolitan Police email read: "Intelligence suggests that a paedophile ring in Belgium made an order for a young girl three days before Madeleine McCann was taken.
"Somebody connected to this group saw Maddie, took a photograph of her and sent it to Belgium. The purchaser agreed that the girl was suitable and Maddie was taken."
The source of the information was anonymous and it is unclear how reliable it is. The files show the email was sent to Leicestershire Police on March 4 this year - but it was apparently not forwarded to Portuguese detectives until April 21.
Belgium has something of a reputation for paedophilia after unemployed electrician Marc Dutroux, 47, was jailed for life in 2004 after being convicted of kidnapping, raping and murdering young girls.
A friend of Kate and Gerry McCann, both 40, from Rothley, Leicestershire, said the couple's private detectives were taking the possible involvement of Belgian paedophiles very seriously.
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