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The former girlfriend of Christian Brueckner, the prime suspect in the disappearance of from a Portuguese holiday resort, says he admitted being close to the youngster’s apartment when she vanished.

In an exclusive interview with The Mail on Sunday, Nakscije Miftari recalled Brueckner falling silent when the subject of Madeleine’s abduction was raised by friends during a party in early 2014 at their flat in Braunschweig, northern .

‘I remember he made no answer to the question. After they went, I asked about Maddie as I did not know anything about her,’ she said.

‘I asked him about it and he said, “I know about Maddie, I was near the hotel at the time. I was living in the area at the time. I am not going to say anything more. I am not a stupid guy, I am a businessman.” ‘

German prosecutors are convinced that sexual predator Brueckner, 44, snatched Madeleine, then aged three, from the Ocean Club resort in Praia da Luz on May 3, 2007, but are struggling to compile enough evidence to bring charges.

Ms Miftari’s dramatic testimony – which she has already shared with German police – is the first in which Brueckner is said to have confessed to being at the scene of the crime.

Speaking for the first time, Ms Miftari, 25, told how terrified she was of violent, controlling Brueckner and of discovering his warped interest in child pornography featuring young blonde girls.

She was just 17 in 2013 when she met the apparently charming and generous owner of a kiosk shop in Braunschweig, where she had gone to buy sweets.

‘The first time I saw him, he was on his mobile phone at the kiosk,’ she said.‘He got off the phone and said, “Hello lady, how can I help you?” I was surprised as no one called me a lady before.

‘He asked me to have a look and choose what I wanted. Then, when I asked him how much I should pay, he said, “Nothing, a lady doesn’t have to pay in my kiosk.” ‘

Despite her being less than half Brueckner’s age, they began dating and Ms Miftari even considered marriage.

But about a year into their relationship, she found child pornography on his mobile phone and laptop, much of it featuring blonde girls.Brueckner was in some of the videos.

When she confronted him, Brueckner launched a savage attack on her.

‘I asked him about the videos and pictures and that’s when he punched me,’ she said. ‘I fell down the stairs and was unconscious for about ten minutes.’

Ms Miftari and her mother reported the assault to police and officers raided the flat, recovering electronic equipment which was later revealed to contain 391 child porn clips photographs and 68 videos, including images of Brueckner abusing the five-year-old daughter of one of his previous girlfriends in a park.

Ignoring her mother’s pleas, Ms Miftari, a German Muslim of Kosovan origin, remained in contact with Brueckner even when he fled to Portugal as police began to close the net.

He was eventually returned to Germany on a European arrest warrant in 2017 and was later given a 15-month prison term for abusing the five-year-old.

German police dramatically announced that he was the prime suspect in the Madeleine case in June 2020, while he was still serving that sentence.

He has since been given a further seven-and-a-half-year prison term for the rape of an American pensioner in Praia da Luz in 2005.

Madeleine vanished from her family’s holiday apartment while her parents, Kate and Gerry McCann, were dining with friends at a nearby tapas restaurant.

German police have established that Brueckner, who denies any involvement in Madeleine’s disappearance and has refused to speak to police or prosecutors, was living in the Algarve.

Mobile phone signals show he was near the Ocean Club resort on the evening of May 3, 2007.

Ms Miftari, who admitted to visiting the Algarve with Brueckner but refused to say whether it was before or after he fled Braunschweig in 2014, is now trying to rebuild her life.

But she still struggles to believe that she fell in love with a monster.

She added: ‘I have no feelings any more for Christian.

‘I cannot believe he was doing all these things.

‘I have heard so much about him in the past year and I was always hoping it was not true, even today.’

<div class="art-ins mol-factbox news" data-version="2" id="mol-8a487ac0-3f42-11ec-beda-b1d2e43c700d" website McCann suspect Brueckner told girlfriend he WAS near villa